And I beheld when he had opened the sixth seal, and, lo, there was a great earthquake; and the sun became black as sackcloth of hair, and the moon became as blood;
The Sixth Seal, Rev 6:12-17
12. a great earthquake ] Earthquakes follow wars, famines, and pestilences in Mat 24:7, as the earlier signs of the approach of Christ’s Coming. But here it is coupled with the darkening of the sun and fall of the stars which, ibid. 29, precede His Coming immediately: whence Alford says, that here it is more than the earth that quakes that it is a fulfilment of Hag 2:6, cf. Heb 12:26 sqq.
black as sackcloth ] The image is used in Isa 50:3.
the moon became ] Read, the moon wholly became, or, the whole [i.e. full] moon became.
as blood ] From Joe 2:31, “the sun shall be turned into darkness, and the moon into blood.” The image, no doubt, is suggested by the phenomena of natural total eclipses, when the sun disappears entirely, but the moon, though ceasing to be luminous, does not in general become invisible, but assumes a dull reddish colour. We are told of “signs in the Heaven” before the fall of Jerusalem which, if natural, must be assigned to this last cause, and in any case may be regarded as partial fulfilments of these prophecies, and types of their final fulfilment. See Jos. B. J. VI. Rev 6:3; Tac. Hist. V. xiii. 1.
Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges
And I beheld when he had opened the sixth seal – See the notes at Rev 5:1; Rev 6:1.
And, lo, there was a great earthquake – Before endeavoring to ascertain to what the sixth seal was designed to refer, it is proper, as in the previous cases, to furnish a particular explanation of the meaning of the symbols. All the symbols represented in the opening of this seal denote consternation, commotion, changes; but still they are all significant, and we are to suppose that something would occur corresponding with each one of them. It cannot be supposed that the things here described were represented on the part of the roll or volume that was now unfolded in any other way than that they were pictures, or that the whole was a species of panoramic representation made to pass before the eyes. Thus understood, it would not be difficult to represent each one of these things in a painting: as the heaving ground – the agitated forests – the trembling hills – the falling cities and houses – the sun blackened, and the moon turned to blood:
(a) The earthquake, Rev 6:12; There was a great earthquake. The word used here denotes a shaking or agitation of the earth. The effect, when violent, is to produce important changes – opening chasms in the earth; throwing down houses and temples; sinking hills, and elevating plains; causing ponds and lakes to dry up, or forming them where none existed; elevating the ocean from its bed, rending rocks, etc. As all that occurs in the opening of the other seals is symbolical, it is to be presumed that this is also, and that for the fulfillment of this we are not to look for a literal earthquake, but for such agitations and changes in the world as would be properly symbolized by this. The earthquake, as a symbol, would merely denote great agitations or overturnings on the earth. The particular character of those changes must be determined by other circumstances in the symbol that would limit and explain it.
There are, it is said, but three literal earthquakes referred to in the Scripture: that mentioned in 1Ki 19:11; that in Uzziahs time, Amo 1:1; Zec 14:5; and what took place at the Saviours death. All the rest are emblematical or symbolical-referring mostly to civil commotions and changes. Then in Hag 2:6-7; Yet once, it is a little while, and I will shake the heavens and the earth, and the sea, and the dry land, and I will shake all nations, and the desire of all nations shall come; and I will fill this house with glory, saith the Lord of hosts. That is, there would be great agitations in the world before he came. See the notes on Heb 12:26-28. So also great changes and commotions are referred to in Isa 24:19-20; The earth is utterly broken down, the earth is clean dissolved, the earth is moved exceedingly. The earth shall reel to and fro like a drunkard, and shall be removed like a cottage. An earthquake, if there were no other circumstances limiting and explaining the symbol, would merely denote great agitation and commotion – as if states and empires were tumbling to ruin. As this is here a mere symbol, it is not necessary to look for a literal fulfillment, or to expect to find in history actual earthquakes to which this had reference, anymore than when it is said that the heavens departed as a scroll we are to expect that they will be literally rolled up; but if, in the course of history, earthquakes preceded remarkable political convulsions and revolutions, it would be proper to represent such events in this way.
(b) The darkening of the sun: And the sun became black as sackcloth of hair. Sackcloth was a coarse black cloth, commonly, though not always, made of hair. It was used for sacks, for strainers, and for mourning garments; and as thus worn it was not an improper emblem of sadness and distress. The idea here is, that the sun put on a dark, dingy, doleful appearance, as if it were in mourning. The general image, then, in this emblem, is that of calamity – as if the very sun should put on the robes of mourning. We are by no means to suppose that this was literally to occur, but that some great calamity would happen, of which this would be an appropriate emblem. See the Isa 13:10 note; Mat 24:29 note; Compare Isa 24:23; Isa 34:4; 1, 3; Isa 60:19-20; Eze 32:7-8; Joe 2:10; Joe 3:15-16; Amo 8:9. What is the particular nature of the calamity is to be learned from other parts of the symbol.
(c) The discoloration of the moon: And the moon became as blood. Red like blood – either from the smoke and vapor that usually precedes an earthquake, or as a mere emblem. This also would betoken calamity, and perhaps the symbol may be so far limited and modified by this as to denote war, for that would be most naturally suggested by the color – red. Compare the notes on Rev 6:4 of this chapter. But any great calamity would be appropriately represented by this – as the change of the moon to such a color would be a natural emblem of distress.
(d) The falling of the stars, Rev 6:13; And the stars of heaven fell unto the earth. This language is derived from the poetic idea that the sky seems to be a solid concave, in which the stars are set, and that when any convulsion takes place, that concave will be shaken, and the stars will be loosened and fall from their places. See this language explained in the notes on Isa 34:4. Sometimes the expanse above us is spoken of as a curtain that is spread out, and that may be rolled up; sometimes as a solid crystalline expanse in which the stars are fixed. According to either representation the stars are described as falling to the earth. If the expanse is rolled up, the stars, having nothing to support them, fall if violent tempests or concussions shake the heavens, the stars, loosened from their fixtures, fall to the earth. Stars, in the Scriptures, are symbols of princes and rulers (see Dan 8:10; Rev 8:10-11; Rev 9:1); and the natural meaning of this symbol is, that there would be commotions which would unsettle princes, and bring them down from their thrones – like stars falling from the sky.
Even as a fig tree casteth her untimely figs – Mart., green; Greek, olunthous. This word properly denotes winter-figs, or such as grow under the leaves, and do not ripen at the proper season, but hang upon the trees during the winter (Robinson, Lexicon). This fruit seldom matures, and easily falls off in the spring of the year (Stuart, in loco). A violent wind shaking a plantation of fig-trees would of course cast many such figs to the ground. The point of the comparison is, the ease with which the stars would seem to be shaken from their places, and hence, the ease with which, in these commotions, princes would be dethroned.
(e) The departing of the heavens, Rev 6:14; And the heaven departed as a scroll. That is, as a book or volume – biblion – rolled up. The heavens are here described as spread out, and their passing away is represented by the idea that they might be rolled up, and thus disappear. See the notes on Isa 34:4. This, too, is a symbol, and we are not to suppose that it will literally occur. Indeed it never can literally occur; and we are not, therefore, to look for the fulfillment of this in any physical fact that would correspond with what is here said. The plain meaning is, that there would be changes as if such an event would happen; that is, that revolutions would occur in the high places of the earth, and among those in power, as if the stars should fall, and the very heavens were swept away. This is the natural meaning of the symbol, and this accords with the usage of the language elsewhere.
(f) The removal of mountains and islands, Rev 6:14; And every mountain and island were moved out of their places. This would denote convulsions in the political or moral world, as great as would occur in the physical world if the very mountains were removed and the islands should change their places. We are not to suppose that this would literally occur; but we should be authorized from this to expect that, in regard to those things which seemed to be permanent and fixed on an immov able basis, like mountains and islands, there would be violent and important changes. If thrones and dynasties long established were overthrown; if institutions that seemed to be fixed and per manent were abolished; if a new order of things should rise in the political world, the meaning of the symbol, so far as the language is concerned, would be fulfilled.
(g) The universal consternation, Rev 6:15-17; And the kings of the earth, etc. The design of these verses Rev 6:15-17, in the varied language used, is evidently to denote universal consternation and alarm – as if the earth should be convulsed, and the stars should fall, and the heavens should pass away. This consternation would extend to all classes of people, and fill the world with alarm, as if the end of all things were coming.
The kings of the earth – Rulers – all who occupied thrones.
The great men – High officers of state.
And the rich men – Their wealth would not secure them from destruction, and they would be alarmed like others.
And the chief captains – The commanders of armies, who tremble like other men when God appears judgment.
And the mighty men – Men of great prowess in battle, but who feel now that they have no power to withstand God.
And every bondman – Servant – doulos. This word does not necessarily denote a slave (compare the Eph 6:5 note; 1Ti 6:1 note; Phm 1:16 note), but here the connection seems to demand it, for it stands in contrast with freeman. There were, in fact, slaves in the Roman empire, and there is no objection in supposing that they are here referred to. There is no reason why they should not be filled with consternation as well as others; and as this does not refer to the end of the world, or the day of judgment, the word here determines nothing as to the question whether slavery is to continue on the earth.
And every freeman – Whether the master of slaves or not. The idea is, that all classes of people, high and low, would be filled with alarm.
Hid themselves in the dens – Among the caves or caverns in the mountains. See the notes on Isa 2:19. These places were resorted to for safety in times of danger. Compare 1Sa 13:6; 24; Jdg 6:2; Jer 41:9; Josephus, Antiq. book 14, chapter 15; Jewish Wars, book 1, chapter 16.
And in the rocks of the mountains – Among the crags or the fastnesses of the mountains – also natural places of refuge in times of hostile invasion or danger. See the notes on Isa 2:21.
And said to the mountains and rocks, Fall on us, … – Rev 6:16. This language is found substantially in Hos 10:8; And they shall say to the mountains, Cover us; and to the hills, Fall on us. It is also used by the Saviour as denoting the consternation which would occur at his coming: Then shall they begin to say to the mountains, Fall on us; and to the hills, Cover us, Luk 23:30. It is language denoting consternation, and an awful fear of impending wrath. The state of mind is that where there is an apprehension that God himself is coming forth with the direct instruments of his vengeance, and where there is a desire rather to be crushed by falling rocks and hills than by the vengeance of his uplifted arm.
From the face of him that sitteth on the throne – The face of God – for he seems to be coming forth with the displays of his vengeance. It is not said that God would actually come forth in a visible form, lint their consternation would be as great as if he were to do this; the state of mind indicated by this was an apprehension that it would be so.
And from the wrath of the Lamb – The Lamb of God; the Lord Jesus. See the notes on Rev 5:6. There seems to be an incongruity between the words wrath, and Lamb; but the word Lamb here is so far a proper name as to be used only to designate the Redeemer. He comes forth to execute wrath, not as a Lamb, but as the Son of God, who bore that name. It would seem from this that they who thus dreaded the impending terrors were aware of their source, or had knowledge enough to understand by whom they were to be inflicted. They would see that these were divine judgments, and would apprehend that the end of the world drew near.
For the great day of his wrath is come – Rev 6:17. The threatening judgments would be so severe and awful that they would suppose that the end of the world was coming.
And who shall be able to stand? – To stand before him, or to withstand his judgments.
It is unnecessary to say that there has been, in this case, as in reference to every other part of the Book of Revelation, a great diversity of opinion respecting the events symbolized by this seal. Grotius applied it to the wars between the Jews and Romans under Nero and Vespasian; Dr. Hammond supposed that the defeat of the Jewish leaders in those wars was particularly symbolized; Mr. Brightman referred these symbols to the persecution under Diocletian; Mr. Mede, Dr. Cressner, Dr. More, Mr. Whiston, Mr. Jurien, Mr. Daubuz, Mr. Lowman, Dr. Newton, Mr. Elliott, and others, refer it to the defeat of the pagan powers, and the final suppression of those powers as opposed to Christianity; Vitringa regarded it as foreshadowing the overthrow of the anti-Christian powers of the western Roman empire; Cocceius explains it of the wars of the Emperor Frederick against the German princes in the sixteenth century; Dr. Woodhouse, of the day of vengeance at the end of the world; Mr. Cunninghame, of the same period as the seventh trumpet, commencing with the French revolution, and to be consummated by the visible advent of the Son of God; Prof. Stuart, of the destruction of Jerusalem; and Mr. Lord, of a series of events, part of which are fulfilled, three of them corresponding with the first three vials – the first expressive of the revolution of France, the second of despotism extending through several rears, and the third of the overthrow of that violent dynasty, at the fall of Bonaparte, in 1815.
It is not my purpose to examine these views; but, amidst this great variety of opinion, it seems to me that the obvious and natural application of the opening of the seal has not been adverted to. I shall suggest it because it is the most natural and obvious, and seems to be demanded by the explanations given of the previous seals. It is, in one word, the impending judgments from the invasions of the northern hordes of Goths and Vandals, threatening the breaking up of the Roman empire – the gathering of the storm, and the hovering of those barbarians on the borders of the empire; the approaches which they made from time to time toward the capital, though restrained as yet from taking it; the tempest of wrath that was, as it were, suspended yet on the frontiers, until the events recorded in the next chapter should occur, then bursting forth in wrath in successive blasts, as denoted by the first four trumpets of the seventh seal Rev 8:1-13, when the empire was entirely overthrown by the Goths and Vandals. The precise point of time which I suppose this seal occupies is that succeeding the last persecution.
It embraces the preparatory arrangements of these hordes of invaders – their gathering on the frontiers of the empire – their threatened approaches toward the capital – and the formation of such vast armies as would produce universal consternation. A brief notice of these preparatory scenes, as adapted to produce the alarm referred to in the opening of the sixth seal, is all that will be necessary here; the more complete detail must be reserved for the explanation of the four trumpets of the seventh seal, when the work of destruction was consummated. These preparations and threatened invasions were events sufficiently important in their relation to the church, to what preceded, and to the future history of the world, to be symbolized here; and they are events in which all the particulars of the symbol may find a fulfillment. Anyone has only to took on a chart of history to see how appropriately this application of the symbol follows, if the previous explanations have been correct. In the illustration of this, in order to show the probability that these events are referred to by the symbols of the sixth seal, I would submit the following remarks:
(1) The time is what would be naturally suggested by this seal in its relation to the others. If the fifth referred to the persecutions under Diocletian – the last great persecution of the pagan powers in attempting to extinguish the Christian name – then we should naturally look for the fulfillment of the opening of the next in some event, or series of events, which would succeed that at no very distant interval, and that pertained to the empire or power that had been the prominent subject of the predictions in the previous seals. It would also be natural to look for some events that might be regarded as conveying an expression of the divine feeling in regard to that power, or that would present it in such an aspect that it would be seen that its power to persecute was at an end. This natural expectation would be answered either by some symbol that would refer to the complete triumph of the Christian system, or by such a series of judgments as would break the persecuting power itself in pieces. Now the threatened irruption of the northern barbarians followed the series of events already described with sufficient nearness to make it proper to regard that series of events as referred to.
(2) The events were of sufficient importance in the history of the empire to deserve this notice in the foreshadowing of what would occur. They were connected with the breaking up of that mighty power, and the complete change of the aspect of the world, in a political and religious point of view. A new order of things arose in the worlds history. A new religion became established. New kingdoms from the fragments of the once-mighty Roman empire were founded, and the affairs of the world were put on a new footing. These mighty northern hordes not only spread consternation and alarm, as if the world were coming to an end, but they laid the foundations of kingdoms which continue to this day. In fact, few more important events have occurred in history.
(3) This series of events was introduced in the manner described in the opening of the sixth seal. I have already said that it is not necessary to suppose, in the fulfillment of the symbol, that there would be a literal earthquake; but nothing in the symbol forbids us to suppose that there might be, and if there were we could not but consider it as remarkable. Now it so happens that the series of events pertaining to the Gothic invasions is introduced by Mr. Gibbon in the following language: 365 a.d. In the second year of the reign of Valentinian and Valens, on the morning of the twenty-first day of July, the greatest part of the Roman world was shaken by a violent and destructive earthquake. The impression was communicated to the waters; the shores of the Mediterranean were left dry by the sudden retreat of the sea; great quantities of fish were caught with the hand; large vessels were stranded on the mud; and a curious spectator amused his eye, or rather his fancy, by contemplating the various appearances of valleys and mountains which had never before, since the formation of the globe, been exposed to the sun. But the tide soon returned, with the weight of an immense and irresistible deluge, which was severely felt on the coasts of Sicily, of Dalmatia, of Greece, and of Egypt; large boats were transported, and lodged on the roofs of houses, or at the distance of two miles from the shore; the people, with their habitations, were swept away by the waters; and the city of Alexandria annually commemorated the day on which fifty thousand persons had lost their lives in the inundation.
This calamity, the report of which was magnified from one province to another, astonished and terrified the subjects of Rome; and their affrighted imagination enlarged the real extent of the momentary evil. They recollected the preceding earthquakes which had subverted the cities of Palestine and Bithynia; they considered these alarming strokes as the prelude only of still more dreadful calamities, and their fearful vanity was disposed to confound the symptoms of a declining empire and a sinking world, vol. ii. pp. 115, 116. Mr. Gibbon then proceeds to detail the evils of war, as greatly surpassing the calamities produced by any natural causes, and adds (p. 116), In the disastrous period of the fall of the Roman empire, which may be justly dated from the reign of Valens, the happiness and security of each individual was personally attacked; and the arts and labors of ages were rudely defaced by the barbarians of Scythia and Germany. He then proceeds with an exceedingly interesting description of the origin, the habits, and the movements of the Tartar nations, particularly the Huns, as they moved to the West, and precipitated the Gothic nations on the provinces of the Roman empire, until Rome itself was thrice besieged, was taken, and was sacked (ii. 116-266).
The earthquake referred to occurred in 365 a.d. The movements of the Huns from their territories in the neighborhood of China had commenced about 100 a.d., and in 375 a.d. they overcame the Goths lying along the Danube. The Goths, pressed and overcome by these savage invaders, asked permission of the Romans to cross the Danube, to find protection in the Roman empire, and to cultivate the waste lands of Thrace (Gibbon, ii. 129, 130). In the year 376 they were transported over the Danube, by the permission of the Roman emperor Valens; an event which, according to Mr. Gibbon, in its ultimate result, was the cause of the downfall of the empire; for they learned their own strength; they were attracted by the riches of the capital and the hope of reward, until they finally drew the Western emperor to Ravenna, sacked Rome, and took possession of Italy.
(4) A slight reference to the series of events in these periods of consternation and conquest may show more closely the nature of the alarms which would be caused by the prospect of these dreadful invasions, and may prepare us for a better understanding of the successive calamities which occurred under these invaders, when the empire fell, as described by the four first trumpets of the seventh seal. I shall copy from the tables of contents of Mr. Gibbons history, under the twenty-sixth, thirtieth, and thirty-first chapters:
| ad | |
| 365 | Earthquakes. |
| 376 | The Huns and Goths. |
| 100 | The emigration of the Huns. |
| 375 | Their victories over the Goths. |
| 376 | The Goths implore the protection of Valens. |
| 376 | They are transported over the Danube into the Roman Empire. |
| 376 | They penetrate into Thrace. |
| 377 | Union of the Goths with Huns, Alani, etc. |
| 378 | Battle of Hadrianople. |
| 378 | The defeat of the Romans. |
| 383-395 | The settlement of the Goths in Thrace and Asia. |
| 395 | Revolt of the Goths. |
| 396 | Alaric marches into Greece. |
| 398 | Is proclaimed king of the Visigoths. |
| 400-403 | He invades Italy. |
| 406 | Radagaisus invades Italy. |
| 406 | Besieges Florence. |
| 406 | Threatens Rome. |
| 406 | The remainder of the Germans invade Gaul. |
| 407 | Desolation of Gaul. |
| 408 | Alaric marches to Rome. |
| 408 | First siege of Rome by the Goths. |
| 408 | Famine, plague, superstition. |
| 409 | Alaric accepts a ransom and raises the siege. |
| 409 | Fruitless negotiations for peace. |
| 409 | Second siege of Rome by the Goths. |
| 410 | Third siege and sack of Rome by the Goths. |
| 410 | Respect of the Goths for the Christian religion. |
| 410 | Pillage and fire of Rome. |
| 410 | Captives and fugitives. |
| 411-416 | Fall of the usurpers Jovinus, Sebastian, and Attalus. |
| 409 | Invasion of Spain by the Suevi, Vandals, Alani, etc. |
| 415-418 | The Goths conquer and restore Spain. |
(5) This would coincide, in the effects produced on the empire, with the consternation and alarm described in the passage before us. The symbols are such as would be employed on the supposition that these are the events referred to; they are such as the events are suited to suggest. The mighty preparations in the East and North – the report of which could not but spread through the empire – would be appropriately symbolized by the earthquake, the darkened sun, the moon becoming like blood, the stars falling, the departing heavens, and the kings and great men of the earth fleeing in alarm to find a place of safety, as if the end of the world were drawing near. Nothing could have been so well adapted to produce the consternation described in the opening of the sixth seal, as the dreaded approach of vast hosts of barbarians from the regions of the North. This alarm would be increased by the fact that their numbers were unknown; that their origin was hidden; and that the advancing multitudes would sweep everything before them.
As in other cases, also, rumour would increase their numbers and augment their ferocity. The sudden shock of an earthquake, the falling stars, the departing heavens, the removal of mountains and islands, and the consternation of kings and all classes of people, would be the appropriate emblems to represent these impending calamities. In confirmation of this, and as showing the effect produced by the approach of the Goths, and the dread of the Gothic arms, in causing universal consternation, the following extracts may be adduced from Mr. Gibbon, when describing the threatened invasion of Alaric, king of the Visigoths. He quotes from Claudian. Fame, says the poet, encircling with terror her gloomy wings, proclaimed the march of the barbarian army, and filled Italy with consternation. Mr. Gibbon adds, the apprehensions of each individual were increased in just proportion to the measure of his fortune; and the most timid, who had already embarked their valuable effects, meditated their escape to the island of Sicily, or to the African coast. The public distress was aggravated by the fears and reproaches of superstition. Every hour produced some horrid tale of strange and portentous accidents; the pagans deplored the neglect of omens and the interruption of sacrifices; but the Christians still derived some comfort from the powerful intercession of the saints and martyrs, ii. 218, 219. See further illustrations in the notes on Rev 8:7-13.
Fuente: Albert Barnes’ Notes on the Bible
Verse 12. The sixth seal] This seal also is opened and introduced by Jesus Christ alone.
A great earthquake] A most stupendous change in the civil and religious constitution of the world. If it refer to Constantine the Great, the change that was made by his conversion to Christianity might be very properly represented under the emblem of an earthquake, and the other symbols mentioned in this and the following verses.
The sun-the ancient pagan government of the Roman empire, was totally darkened; and, like a black hair sackcloth, was degraded and humbled to the dust.
The moon-the ecclesiastical state of the same empire, became as blood-was totally ruined, their sacred rites abrogated, their priests and religious institutions desecrated, their altars cast down, their temples destroyed, or turned into places for Christian worship.
Fuente: Adam Clarke’s Commentary and Critical Notes on the Bible
And I beheld when he had opened the sixth seal; the sixth of those seals with which the book was sealed, mentioned Rev 5:1; this signifieth the revelation of some things which should happen in some certain period of time, but what period is the question, as to which interpreters differ. Some think, the time when Jerusalem was taken; but this was a time past twenty-six or twenty-seven years before John was in Patmos, where he had this vision about things that shall be, Rev 1:1; 22:6. Some think, that period of time which shall be immediately before the day of judgment; but that guess seemeth worse, for after this there was a seventh seal to be opened. Some think, the period of the churchs conflict with antichrist. But Mr. Medes judgment (followed by many other famous men) seems best, that it denotes that period when Constantine, the first Christian emperor, restored peace to the church, by overturning the whole pagan state, and making Christianity the religion of the greatest part of the world. This was about the year 311, and perfected upon his victory over Licinius, 325. In this I acquiesce. Let us now see how what is said in this and the following verses about this period will agree to that time.
And, lo, there was a great earthquake: the great question is here, what is meant by this great earthquake, the darkening of the sun, the moon becoming as blood, &c. No history recording any such prodigies, hath made many (taking these things in the natural, literal sense) to say the period under the first seal signifies either the time when Jerusalem was taken, or the day of judgment; but there is a metaphorical sense of these expressions, very usual in the prophetical writings, to show great changes in states; and in this sense it is to be taken here. Thus the prophet describeth the great change God would make in Jerusalem, Isa 29:6, Thou shalt be visited of the Lord of hosts with thunder, and with earthquake, and great noise, with storm and tempest, and the flame of devouring fire: and Jer 15:9, Her sun is gone down whlie it was yet day. And, Eze 32:7, the change God would work in the ruin of Egypt, is thus expressed: When I shall put thee out, I will cover the heaven, and make the stars thereof dark; and the moon shall not give her light. All the bright lights of heaven will I make dark over thee. So Joe 2:10,31, and Joe 3:15. What is an earthquake, but the shaking of the earth? And under this notion God expresseth the changes he makes in states and kingdoms, Isa 2:19,21; 24:18; Hag 2:6,7. Thus by
earthquake here is to be understood a great change in the Roman empire.
And the sun became black as sackcloth of hair, and the moon became as blood: the sun signifies those that are in the highest power; the moon, those that are next to them in place and dignity.
Fuente: English Annotations on the Holy Bible by Matthew Poole
12. As Rev 6:4;Rev 6:6-8, the sword,famine, and pestilence, answer to Mat 24:6;Mat 24:7; Rev 6:9;Rev 6:10, as to martyrdoms,answer to Mat 24:9; Mat 24:10;so this passage, Rev 6:12;Rev 6:17, answers to Mat 24:29;Mat 24:30, “the sun shall bedarkened, and the moon shall not give her light, and the stars shallfall from heaven; . . . then shall all the tribes of the earth mourn,and they shall see the Son of man coming”; imagery describingthe portents of the immediate coming of the day of the Lord;but not the coming itself until the elect are sealed, and thejudgments invoked by the martyrs descend on the earth, the sea, andthe trees (Re 7:1-3).
and, loSo A reads. ButB and C omit “lo.”
earthquakeGreek,“shaking” of the heavens, the sea, and the dry land;the shaking of these mutable things being the necessary preliminaryto the setting up of those things which cannot be shaken. Thisis one of the catchwords [WORDSWORTH]connecting the sixth seal with the sixth trumpet (Re11:13) and the seventh vial (Re16:17-21); also the seventh seal (Re8:5).
sackclothOne kind,made of the “hair” of Cilician goats, was called”cilicium,” or Cilician cloth, and was used for tents, c.Paul, a Cilician, made such tents (Ac18:3).
moonA, B, C, andoldest versions read, “the whole moon” the full moon; notmerely the crescent moon.
as blood (Joe2:31).
Fuente: Jamieson, Fausset and Brown’s Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible
And I beheld when he had opened the sixth seal,…. Of the sealed book which the Lamb took out of the hand of him that sat upon the throne, in order to open it, and unloose its seals. About this seal interpreters much differ; some refer this to the destruction of Jerusalem, because of the likeness of expressions here used, and in
Mt 24:7; but this was past many years before this seal was opened; and besides, though that time was a day of wrath to the uttermost upon the Jewish people, and it was the Lamb’s day of wrath, taking vengeance on them for their unbelief and rejection of him as the Messiah; yet they had no sense of the Lamb, nor any apprehension of his wrath at that time, nor have they now, but imputed their calamity to their divisions and quarrels among themselves. Others think this seal belongs to the destruction of the Roman empire by the Goths, Huns, Vandals, c. but it should be observed, that the empire stood some hundreds of years after the end of the fifth seal and the opening of this and it was after the seventh seal, and at the sounding of the trumpets, that that destruction came on; moreover, that calamity was by the savageness of some barbarous nations which overrun the empire, but this here spoken of comes from the wrath of the Lamb; add to which, that that calamity distressed the Christians in the empire, and them chiefly, whereas this falls only upon the enemies of the Lamb, and the persecutors of his people. Others are of opinion that this has respect to the strange change of affairs in the church of Christ, through the rise, power, and tyranny of antichrist; by “the earthquake” they suppose is meant the shaking of both church and state by the man of sin; who shook the doctrines, ordinances, and discipline of the church, and threw all into confusion, and introduced a new face of things; and also shook the kingdoms of the earth, and the thrones and crowns of princes: by the “sun” becoming “black”, they think is meant the sun of righteousness, Jesus Christ, who was obscured in the doctrines concerning him, as the one and only Mediator, and justification by his righteousness, and pardon through his blood, by introducing the mediation of angels and saints, the doctrine of justification by works, and the doctrine of merit, works of supererogation, indulgences, pardons, penance, and purgatory: by the “moon” they understand the church, which receives all its light, grace, righteousness, and holiness, from Christ, and which, like the moon, is changeable as to its outward form and circumstances; and this became “as blood”, through the persecutions, massacres, and cruelties of the Romish antichrist, who has been made drunk with the blood of the saints and martyrs of Jesus: the “stars” they take to be the ministers of the word; either hypocritical ones, who were like unripe figs, destitute of true grace, and so were easily shaken with the wind of Papal power, and fell into the earth, and apostatized from the faith, and conformed to the corruptions of antichrist; or the true ministers of the Gospel, who were put to death, and that to an untimely and violent one, signified by the shaking of untimely figs by a mighty wind: by the “heaven” departing as a scroll rolled up, they suppose is designed either the church, which fled into the wilderness, and remained invisible during the Papal power and cruelty; or else the Scriptures, which the pope made himself sole judge and interpreter of and shut up from the common people in an unknown language, and forbid the laity the reading of them: by “mountains” they think are intended the kings and princes of the earth, who were obliged to submit to the Romish antichrist, and give their kingdoms to him, and receive their crowns and kingdoms from him, and be his vassals: and by “the islands”, the people their subjects, who were forced to acknowledge him as the supreme head, and receive his mark in their right hand or forehead, or they could not buy and sell: and by all ranks and degrees of men, as “kings”, c. hiding themselves in rocks and mountains, and calling upon them to fall on them and cover them, they apply either to their invoking the virgin Mary, and other saints, to intercede for them, and screen them from the wrath of God and Christ, on account of their sins or else to the persecutors of the saints, of every rank and in every age, and to the punishments that shall fall upon them. But however feasible this interpretation may seem to be, it is certain that this was not the face of things at the close of the fifth seal, or the Dioclesian persecution, and at the opening of the sixth, when Constantine came to the imperial throne, for then the church appeared as she is described in Re 12:1; which is just the reverse of this. There are others, who because of the very awful things here spoken of, and the very awful language in which they are expressed, conclude that this seal respects the day of judgment; not considering that the fifth seal ends about the year 313, at the close of the last of the ten persecutions, and that the sixth seal begins where that ends; and though above 1750 years have elapsed since that time, yet the day of judgment is not come, and we know not when it will; besides, here is another seal, a seventh seal, which follows, and introduces punishments on the Roman empire, and seven vials follow, which pour out plagues upon antichrist, all which can never be thought to be after the day of judgment; moreover, the account of the day of judgment stands in its proper place in Re 20:12; after the destruction of Babylon, the first resurrection, and the saints’ thousand years’ reign with Christ. But to proceed; the business which is the subject of this seal is the removing of Paganism, and Pagan governors out of the Roman empire; this was the thing the rider upon the white horse, under the first seal, set out upon to effect, and never ceased until he had accomplished it; and this is what ensued upon the close of the fifth seal, when Pagan persecution ceased, on Constantine, a Christian emperor, having the reins of power in his hands; and it cannot be thought, that so wonderful a change of things as this should be omitted in this prophetic history; and it is easy to observe that changes in kingdoms and governments, both as to the polity and religion of them, are sometimes expressed in such like figurative terms as here; see Isa 13:9; and which may be accommodated to this event as follows:
and, lo, there was a great earthquake; or “shaking”, both of the heavens and earth, and which, as it denotes in Hag 2:6; compared with Heb 12:26; the removing of Jewish worship and ordinances, in order to make way for the Christian ordinances and institutions, which were to remain; so here it intends the removing of Pagan worship and idolatry, and of Pagan magistrates, that the Christian religion and Christian magistrates might take place. This, with what follows, concerning the darkness of the sun and moon, might be literally true; and it seems by historians, that there were such phenomena about those times; for it is asserted h, that a very great earthquake in Syria followed the Dioclesian persecution, which shook and caused to fall the tops of houses at Tyre and Sidon, and killed many thousands; and some such like happened at Rome, and at Spoletum, where above three hundred and fifty Pagans perished, as they were serving their idols. It is also observed i, that the moon was turned into blood in the times of Galerius, who succeeded. Dioclesian; and that the sun failed, and the stars shined for four hours, when Licinius was conquered by Constantine; but then these may be considered as symbols of the change in the empire.
And the sun came black as sackcloth of hair; which is made of black hairs; see Isa 50:3; as when eclipsed. The sun was the chief deity worshipped by the Heathens, under various names, and this becoming black, may design the removing of their principal gods from their honour and glory, or the downfall of idolatry, which the Jews k call , “the sun of idolatry”, which they suppose is meant in So 1:6. And Satan, the god of this world, who was worshipped in different forms, now fell, as Lucifer, the son of the morning, and as lightning from heaven, and was cast down from all his dignity, influence, and power, to the earth; for the casting out of the red dragon, the old serpent, and Satan, after his combat with Michael and his angels, in Re 12:3, refers to this very time; likewise the chief magistrate, the Heathen Roman emperor, may be included; and it is remarkable, that Dioclesian the emperor, who had now retired from the imperial government, and was under a cloud, under disgrace, and in distress, had, in the zenith of his glory, caused himself to be worshipped as a god, and as the brother of the sun and moon.
And the moon became as blood; as when obscured; the Alexandrian copy and some others, the Complutensian edition, the Vulgate Latin, and all the Oriental versions, read, “the whole moon”; this may design the next Heathen deity, or class of deities, for the moon was also worshipped by the Heathens under different names; and may likewise include the Pagan priesthood, which was next, and was annexed to the imperial dignity; and which was disused by, Constantine and his successors; and even the very title, and the robe which was a symbol of it, were laid aside as unworthy of Christian princes; see Mede upon the place.
h Magdeburg. Centuriator. cent. 4. c. 3. p. 86. & c. 13. p. 837. i Alsted. Chronolog. Thesaur. p. 59. k Shirhashirim Rabba, fol. 6. 2.
Fuente: John Gill’s Exposition of the Entire Bible
There was a great earthquake ( ). “There came a great earthquake.” Jesus spoke of earthquakes in his great eschatological discourse (Mr 13:8). In Mt 24:29 the powers of the heavens will be shaken. is from , to shake, and occurs also in Rev 8:5; Rev 11:13; Rev 11:19; Rev 16:18. The reference is not a local earthquake like those so common in Asia Minor.
As sackcloth of hair ( ). (Attic ), Latin saccus, English sack, originally a bag for holding things (Gen 42:25; Gen 42:35), then coarse garment of hair (, old word from , here only in N.T.) clinging to one like a sack, of mourners, suppliants, prophets leading austere lives (Matt 3:4; Matt 11:21; Luke 10:13). Here the hair is that of the black goat (Isa 50:3). Cf. Joel 2:10; Ezek 32:7; Isa 13:10; Mark 13:24. See Ec 12:2 for eclipses treated as symbols of old age. Apocalyptic pictures all have celestial phenomena following earthquakes.
As blood ( ). In Ac 2:20 we find Peter interpreting the apocalyptic eschatological language of Joe 2:31 about the sun being turned into darkness and the moon into blood as pointing to the events of the day of Pentecost as also “the great day of the Lord.” Peter’s interpretation of Joel should make us cautious about too literal an exegesis of these grand symbols.
Fuente: Robertson’s Word Pictures in the New Testament
The sixth seal. “The Apocalypse is molded by the great discourse of our Lord upon ‘the last things’ which has been preserved for us in the first three Gospels (Mt 24:4; 25.; Mr 13:5 – 37; Luk 21:8 – 36; compare Rev 17:20 – 37). The parallelism between the two is, to a certain extent, acknowledged by all inquirers, and is indeed, in many respects, so obvious, that it can hardly escape the notice of even the ordinary reader. Let any one compare, for example, the account of the opening of the sixth seal with the description of the end (Mt 24:29, 30), and he will see that the one is almost a transcript of the other. It is remarkable that we find no account of this discourse in the Gospel of St. John; nor does it seem as sufficient explanation of the omission that the later Evangelist was satisfied with the records of the discourse already given by his predecessors” (Milligan).
Earthquake [] . Lit., shaking. Used also of a tempest. See on Mt 8:24, and compare Mt 24:7. The word here is not necessarily confined to shaking the earth. In Mt 24:29, it is predicted that the powers of the heavens shall be shaken (saleuqhsontai, see on Luk 21:26). Here also the heaven is removed (verse 14). Compare Heb 12:26, where the verb seiw to shake (kindred with seismov) is used.
Black as sackcloth of hair [ ] . Compare Mt 24:29; Isa 50:3; Isa 13:10; Jer 4:23; Eze 32:7, 8; Joe 2:31; Joe 3:15; Amo 8:9, 10; Mic 3:6. For sackcloth, see on Luk 10:13. The moon [ ] . Add olh whole. Rev., the whole moon.
Fuente: Vincent’s Word Studies in the New Testament
(THE SIXTH SEAL DISCLOSED) v. 12-17 Pending Judgment and Cries of the Mighty
1) “And I beheld when he had opened the sixth seal,” (kai eidon hote enoiksen ten sphragida ten hekten) “And I saw or recognized when he (the Lamb) had opened or broken the sixth (of the seven) seals; because he was worthy, Rev 5:2; Rev 5:9; Rev 5:12. Let it be observed that the number six” is the number of man in his unregenerate state of enmity against God, Rev 13:18; Dan 3:1; 1Sa 17:4.
2) “And, lo, there was a great earthquake,” (kai seismos megas egeneto) “And there became (existed) a great earthquake,” seismographic upheaval, Mat 24:7; Mat 24:29. While earthquakes occur and recur as natural judgmental causes and results of sin in the created universe they are to increase until the end of the time of the tribulation the great when this mighty, final quake comes, heralding the coming of our Lord to the earth, in power and great glory, Mat 24:30-31.
3) “And the sun became black as sackcloth of hair,” (kai ho helios egeneto megas hos sakkos trichinos) “And the sun became black as (much like) or similar to sackcloth made of hair,” apparently resulting from atmospheric disturbances resulting from the mighty earthquake; of this, “The day of the Lord,” Joel prophecied, Joe 2:1; Joe 2:10.
4) “And the moon became as blood,” (kai he selene hole egeneto hos haima) “And the whole (the entire) moon became as (in appearance like) blood; a reddening of the moon appears as-a full moon in a time of total eclipse, Joel further described this terrible prelude of earthly upheaval and cataclysmic catastrophe that heralds the coming of our Lord to the earth in judgment, Joe 2:30-31; Isa 24:21-23.
Fuente: Garner-Howes Baptist Commentary
Strauss Comments
SECTION 20
Text: Rev. 6:12-17
12 And I saw when he opened the sixth seal, and there was a great earthquake; and the sun became black as sackcloth of hair, and the whole moon became as blood; 13 and the stars of the heaven fell unto the earth, as a fig tree casteth her unripe figs when she is shaken of a great wind. 14 And the heaven was removed as a scroll when it is rolled up; and every mountain and island were moved out of their places. 15 And the kings of the earth, and the princes, and the chief captains, and the rich, and the strong, and every bondman and freeman, hid themselves in the caves and in the rocks of the mountains; 16 and they say to the mountains and to the rocks, Fall on us, and hide us from the face of him that sitteth on the throne, and from the wrath of the Lamb: 17 for the great day of their wrath is come; and who is able to stand?
Initial Questions Rev. 6:12-17
1.
What is the O.T. source of the imagery of the sixth seal Rev. 6:12? (See Joel chp. Rev. 2:1 ff)
2.
The devastation was so terrible that the habitants of the earth did what Rev. 6:15?
3.
Is there a hiding place from God?
4.
Is it paradoxical to speak of the wrath of the Lamb Rev. 6:16?
5.
Who will be able to stand in the day of Gods wrath Rev. 6:17?
Rev. 6:12
The sixth seal is the revelation of Gods day of wrath (Rev. 6:12-17). The imagery in this section of scripture is taken almost verbally from the biblical sources. The earthquake comes from Matthew 24 :, the sun black and the moon turned to blood (Joe. 2:31 note Joel chap Rev. 2:28 f was quoted by Peter on the Day of Pentecost), the star fallen from heaven like figs from a fig tree (Isa. 34:4), the sky rolled up like a scroll (Isa. 34:4), the rulers of the earth hiding (Isa. 2:10), calling for the rocks and mountains to fall upon them (Hos. 10:8), are all familiar images to signify the end of the present world order.
The relationship of the structure of The Revelation to the great eschatological discourse of our Lord (Mat. 24:4; Mat. 25:1 ff; Mar. 13:5-37; Luk. 21:8-36 see also Luk. 17:20-37) is acknowledged by every competent scholar.
Note: We now have a paradigm of conservative, scholarly research in the work of Herman Ridderbos, a brilliant Dutch Calvinist. The Coming of the Kingdom, Presbyterian Reformed Pub. Co., 1962, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania this is a must for all concerned with the eschatology of The Synoptic Gospels and specifically with the passages mentioned above on our Lords discourse on the last things. Dr. Ridderbos is acutely aware of all top level critical scholarship as he enters the arena with C. H. Dodds realized eschatology (no ultimate wrath, judgment, nor hell), Oscar Cullmann, a mediating Lutheran scholar of the first rank, R. Bultmann, the father of contemporary theology which utilizes the categories of Existential anthropology to reinterpret the scriptures, and K. Barth, the architect of the greatest systematic presentation of a theology since Calvin. Thank God for a man that is committed to the Word, and is also alert to every scholarly work in the field!
Then these things begin to occur they say to the mountains and to the rocks: Fall ye (pesete 2 aor. imper. the rocks were commanded to fall do it now) on us and hide (krupsate 1st aor. imper. they also commanded that the rocks hide them tense of urgency) us from the face (the presence of a Semitic manner of speaking) of the one sitting on the throne and from the wrath of the Lamb. The judgments of God are so severe that the rich and poor, the strong and the weak, strive to hide, but there is no hiding place. Why?
Rev. 6:17
because the great day of their wrath came (elthen 2 aor. ind. it came in a moment there was no time to prepare for it now!) and who is able (can) stand (stathenai 1st. aor. inf. passive voice) who will be permitted to stand?) For the great day (h hemera h megal) see Joe. 2:11; Zep. 1:14; Jud. 1:6). This powerful vision was presented to us with the paradoxical elements of the wrath of a lamb. Lambs are not full of wrath, but the Lamb of God who taketh away the sins of the world is full of wrath for those who deny His vicarious atonement for sin.
Swete answers the concluding question who is able to stand? with the words of Christ found in Luk. 21:36. But watch ye at every season, making supplication, that ye may prevail to escape all these things that shall come to pass, and to stand before the Son of Man. (1901 R.V.)
This scene speaks eloquently against the hideous heresy of universalism, which is rearing its ugly head again in high and low places. (See the brief discussion in appendix after this chapter.)
Note: Sermon Suggestion No Place to Hide!
Introduction: David Bradley reported his experiences in the bomber which dropped the first nuclear weapon on Japan. He wrote a book entitled No Place to Hide. This is even more true of the one sitting on the throne and wrath of the Lamb. No one will be able to stand!
I. Men seek Security today as never before, but will not find human forms of security adequate for that hour.
II. Men are alienated today as never before. They try to hide in the escape mechanisms of this world, but even the sea and the graves cannot hide us from the wrath of the Lamb.
III. Men are seeking prestige by attaining the status symbols of our day. We try to hide from our real selves. Before we can respond to the Gospel we must know who we are before God, in order to become what we ought to as followers of Christ. Rollo May says, in his The Meaning of Anxiety, that mans ultimate concern today is to know the answer to the question Who am I and what is the meaning of my existence?
Conclusion: What is Your answer to the question Who Can Stand? While those outside of Christ cry for the mountains and rocks to fall on them and hide them, those of us in Christ have a rock that is cleft for our hiding place.
Rock of Ages
Rock of Ages, cleft for me; Let me hide myself in thee;
Not the labor of my hands can fulfill the laws demands;
Nothing in my hand I bring: Simply to thy cross I cling:
Note: We are under obligation to Leon Morris for his excellent survey study of The Biblical Doctrine of Judgment. Tyndale Press, London, 1960. Now in hard back and handled by Eerdmans, Grand Rapids, Michigan.
Many people deny the objective wrath of God, ultimate judgment, an ultimate Hell, but there are many different reasons given for rejecting these doctrines. The unitarian-Universalist coalition deny the validity of Hell, because the nature of God (they say) necessitates that everyone be ultimately saved. The Jehovahs Witnesses deny the reality of Hell, but for a different reason; they say that Hell is not a biblical doctrine. The vast majority of contemporary theologians deny the existence of Hell, because of their new views of revelation.
Dr. Morris book is divided into four chapters:
1.
Judgment in the O.T. Shaphat.
2.
Judgment in the O.T.; other words than Shaphat.
3.
Judgment in the N.T.; A Present Reality.
4.
Judgment in the N.T.; A future Certainty.
Dr. Morris deals sagaciously with the best critical literature which strives, but vainly, to show that the Bible does not speak of an eschatological wrath, and ultimate judgment. Morris brilliantly, but simply, shows the fallacious reasoning of those who would empty the biblical declarations of their ultimate truth.
Review Questions for the Entire Chapter 6
1.
What is a possible identification of the rider on the white horse Rev. 6:1?
2.
What does the symbol of the red horse mean Rev. 6:4?
3.
Discuss some of the spiritual factors involved in War Rev. 6:4.
4.
In our World does it look like evil or righteousness shall prevail see Rev. 6:4?
5.
What is the purpose of the third seal Rev. 6:5?
6.
Discuss the inter-relationship of war and scarcity as it is a present reality in our world.
7.
How meaningful is our Christian Faith in times of crisis Rev. 6:8?
8.
What were the reasons given for the saints being slain Rev. 6:9?
9.
Discuss the problem of evil with respect to Gods justice, righteousness, and power Rev. 6:10.
10.
Why were the saints told to rest Rev. 6:11?
11.
Discuss the inter-relationship of Mat. 24:1 ff, and this section of The Revelation Rev. 6:12/
12.
Who does their wrath refer to in Rev. 6:17?
Special Study
The Gospel, The Gulf of Guilt, and
Resurgent Universalism!
Scripture: Luk. 13:22-30
22. And he went on his way through cities and villages, teaching, and journeying on unto Jerusalem. 23. And one said unto him, Lord, are they few that are saved?
Text: Rom. 3:26
I say of his righteousness at this present season that he might himself be just, and the justifier of him that hath faith in Jesus.
On April 11, 1961, another trial began in the city of Jerusalem, Palestine, which, like another trial in that city 1,929 years ago, was concerned with Justice, Righteousness, Guilt, and Forgiveness. The Jewish Court today, as during the trial of Jesus, sought only justice. What is Justice?
Adolf Eichmann, chief of the Gestapo of Jewish Affairs, was responsible for the liquidation of six million Jews! There is no punishment fit for the crime; a crime primarily committed on a little farm in Eastern Poland Auschwitz! He was set out for all to see, as was Jesus. The world waited for the day when Eichmann would take the stand what would he say? What could he say? When the bench gave him permission to take the stand, his first words were Ich bin unschuldig! (I am not guilty). Eichmanns reply raised the fundamental problem of the gulf guilt, and how this gulf is to be bridged if at all. Nothing less than the Christian Gospel is at stake!
The Church of Jesus Christ is on trial again! It has been summoned by mankind to justify its existence. How can the cause of Christ face up to the phenomenon of a dynamic, resurgent universalism? In fact universalism is advancing at such alarming rate that the Evangelical fortnightly, Christianity Today is sponsoring a call and challenge to Bible believing preachers all over the world to reply to the cancerous heresy by a higher level proclamation of the Word. Yes, indeed the Church is on trial as never before in her history; so also is the Christian view of the need of fallen men, and his inability to meet his own need. This Twentieth Century trial, as did a first century Jerusalem trial, exemplifies three crucial matters, from a biblical perspective. Something is radically wrong with man; (1) The Offense is Sin; (2) The Offender is Man; and (3) The Offended is God! How can reconciliation be brought about? How can the injured grant peace of forgiveness to the injuror? What makes forgiveness possible?
There is an insidious disease which has reached epidemic proportions and is paralizing the spiritual and evangelistic life of the Church; its name is universalism. This strange forboding term and its implications for biblically oriented Christians must be diagnosed, and prognosis given immediately if a revitalized and commission-bearing church is to speak prophetically, and live redemptively before our generation on behalf of God in Christ.
We can plan our spiritual counter-attach better after we have a more intelligent understanding of the high strategy of hell. The demoniac strategists of the realm of darkness are heralding to contemporary man that all men are already saved. A most consoling message! The sole purpose for the community of the committed to fulfill is to announce that factfar and wide. Universalism is that doctrine that declares a complete restoration of all men to a redeemed relationship with the living God (the theological term is apokatastosis panton). There are so many adherents of this doctrine today that as intelligent, concerned Christians we must be brought to the realization that this position cuts the spiritual nerve center of the Christian faith, and the possibility of Evangelizing the world in fulfillment of Christs final commission Go into all the World.
Possibly, we can have a clearer vision of this position which is held by both theological giants, and many pew padders alike; the doctrine of universalism asserts that the gulf is bridged solely because the nature of God is love and holy love cannot indict sinful man with eternal condemnation. This position implies that Gods wrath and judgment are solely corrective and restorative. This deceptive error is that punishment is curative or deterrent, and not as deserved!
Contemporary Universalism asserts three things; (1) The omnipotence of God necessitates the universal salvation of man; (2) The sovereign Lordship of God in Christ is meaningful only if this Lordship necessarily entails the redemption of all men; (3) The irresistibility of the Word of God necessarily means the redemption of all non-Christians, Satan, and his angels of darkness.
As early as Origen the doctrine of restorationism was being spread abroad. He hoped that all men would be redeemed; he also thought that Satan and fallen angels would be stored. Gregory of Nyssa, Gregory Nazianzen, and Theodore of Mopsuesta also held that the purpose of punishment is to reform and not condemn. Augustines repudiation of this doctrine sowed the process of its dissemination. During the 18th and 19th centuries revival brought this wretched heresy into sharper focus than before. This theological aberration gave birth to the philosophical mutation transcendentalism. The pantheistic tendencies of the period spawned a new breed of preachers. These went far and wide repudiating future punishment or hell. Their words were soothing as even the unpenitent, belligerent sceptic was informed that the holy God would not be thwarted even by their overt animosity to all things holy.
Those who maintain universalism today, do so but at the expense of the Bible as the Word of God. The new prophets of universalism have been called by a god who is not the God of Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and the father of Jesus Christ; and have been commissioned to proclaim a message not authorized by the holy Scripture. Every major contemporary theologian has been schooled in the doctrine of universalism, and has learned well his lessons.
Reinhold Niebuhr would have us believe that man is only in an existential predicament. Sin can be painlessly extracted from this predicament and then the patient can go back on the shores of eternal bliss. God is love; His nature precludes that the separation be eternal. Complete restoration is inevitable!
Another creative Athenian, Dr. Paul Tillich, provides fallen man with sanctified certainty that his redemption has been gained. This voice in the wilderness has compelled many to go out to hear him and have stayed to be anesthetized into spiritual insensibility by his new healing balm universalism. His disciples have returned to the pew with a new zealous defiance toward any call to a closer walk with the master of men. Dr. Tillichs redeemer is a tertium quid, neither man nor God! I humbly suggest that Dr. Tillichs pointer symbol (Jesus is the symbol of Christ pointing men to God) will be powerless to grant forgiveness to the sinner and provide security to the day of the wrath of God. If the universal redemption of all men is to be accomplished, I doubt that this prophetic voice is spokesmen for a saviour adequate for the task.
Another architect of contemporary theological thought is Dr. Karl Barth. He is a specialist in anesthetizing his theologically inclined auditors. His doctrine of grace which reveals its irresistible power in the triumph of election in Christ. All men are elected to eternal life in Christ, whether they are aware of it or not!
The great and the small among the fraternity of theologians maintain, with a concerted voice, that Gods love necessarily results in the redemption of all men. This assertion must be challenged, if the church is to be rallied from her deadly sleep. The great physician must be beseeched immediately to empower His body again, if the impotence caused by this spiritual sleeping sickness is to be overcome. The spokesmen for the complete restoration of men are growing more numerous. There are many, both high and low, on the ecclesiastical ladder who maintain this fallacious doctrine. Dr. Nels F. S. Ferre declares in favor of universalism in these words as he defines agape (one of the N.T. words translated Love) as indiscriminate kindness to all (p. 57 Christ and The Christian Harper, 1958). He categorically asserts that salvation is universal in actual extent. (Ibid. pp. 246247). He calls the doctrine of the second coming of Christ the darkest of all umbrellas, because it makes sense of hell and eternal punishment and thus repudiates his doctrine of God as agape. (See p. 33, The Sun and The Umbrella). Can the gulf of guilt be bridged in this manner? It will not do merely to assert that God has so bridged the gulf of guilt. Is it actually bridged in this manner? We turn now to consider the position of those who maintain the universal restorations of all men on the basis of the new unbiblical views of the nature of revelation, and the nature of God as agape (in the special sense of their new definition), and in our final point we will consider some of the biblical doctrines which are not in harmony with the complete restoration doctrine.
I. Contemporary Universalism in Grounded in a
Non-biblical View of the Nature of Revelation
How does God reveal himself? Most contemporary theologians deny that revelation is propositional. By propositional revelation we mean that the words and sentences in the Bible are very revelation. Those who maintain the doctrine of universalism, at least in its modern dress, deny that the Bible is the Word of God. They set forth an anti-biblical view of revelation as they speak ambiguously about events as being the revelation, but since there are no infallible records (according to them), the information from the first century Christians (The New Testament) is of no greater value than the theological systems of Doctors Barth, Bultmann, Tillich, Niebuhr, or Ferr; in fact, they are of less to many. If this thesis is true, then let us trace the steps historically which led to this new view of revelation and makes universalism so feasible within the framework of its theological presuppositions.
What are the major attitudes toward the nature of revelation found in contemporary thought, and in what ways do these effect the problem of universalism? In order to deal with these questions, let us retrace some of the more crucial steps in the development of the contemporary mind.
The New Testament clearly reveals an apostolic insistence on revealed truth. The Apostolic Fathers of the second and third centuries were preoccupied with proving the validity of the Christian religion against Jewish and pagan rejections of Jesus as Christ. The paramount issue revolves about the relation of reason to revelation. The traditional position (from Apostolic Fathers to the modern period) has been that reason and revelation constitute two distinct sources of knowledge or truth. Contemporary insistences on a single source of knowledge react violently to this claim.
The Jewish Philosopher-Theologian, Martin Buber has provided many Christian theologians with a new view of religious knowledge. His view is clearly set forth in his small, popularly written work I-Thou. He maintains that we come to know people in a different manner than we know things. This means that we never necessarily know God through scripture, or evidence of any kind. Commitment becomes totally an irrational leap. This position completely rejects the uniqueness of the Christian revelation. Salvation then becomes available to anyone open or responsive to the Thou (supposedly God). Salvation is no longer dependent on the work of Christ on the Cross and empty tomb. Revelation is no longer content or revealed information, but rather an encounter of man with God, not mediated through the language of scripture, or anything else.
The contemporary anti-biblical attitude toward revelation leads us to consider a corollary doctrine the nature of God as agape (as defined in the new theology), and if this is His nature, then no one can thwart His redemptive love, therefore,
must be saved; therefore, mans acceptance or response to God has nothing to do with mans salvation. Yet, the personification of this redemptive love declared Marvel not at this; for the hour cometh, in which all that are in the tombs shall hear his voice, and shall come forth; they that have done good, unto the resurrection of life; and they that have done evil, unto the resurrection of judgment. (Joh. 5:28-29; R.V., 1901). Negative Biblical criticism and the so-called assured scientific results play a role in the rejection of the Bible as the Word of God, but we will by-pass this particular problem and move to specific declarations of major theologians concerning their repudiation of the Bible as the very Word of God.
Archbishop William Temple was a giant among the theological Philistines. He declares against the unique status of the Bible in these wordsWhat is offered to mans apprehension in any specific revelation is no truth concerning but the living God Himself. (See Nature, Man, and God, p. 322). This is a categorical rejection of the propositions of the Bible as very revelation. Emil Brunner said the fate of the Bible is the fate of Christianity, but he is very hard on this object which determines the fate of Christianity. The Bible of Brunner, Barth, Bultmann, and their disciples is a document capable of yielding the doctrine of universalism; but we must not confuse their Bible with the one on which the church has kindled her evangelistic compassion for centuries. Much of the contemporary Churchs zeal for the lost has been dissipated, because it has been served from the source of the power of God unto salvation. This conclusion leads us to consider a second problem which arises out of the first the nature of God as Love.
Advocates of open membership maintain, implicitly and explicitly, a view of revelation which stands in marked tension with the biblical data. When one maintains that we must not allow even baptism to be a stumbling block to a person seeking to become a member of the Church of Christ, he is maintaining an implicit view of the will of God. How do the advocates of Open Membership know that it is more Christian to accept the pious unimmersed as fellow Christians than to deny to them the aforementioned status. Though we cannot here consider the intricacies of the contemporary debate concerning the nature of revelation, theological language, etc., we can assert that those who maintain the view mentioned above, do so by implying a new gnostic source of religious knowledge. Those of us who deny the validity of open membership have a right to demand that they clearly articulate a defensible view of the nature of revelation and religious discourse. This has not been observed, at least by this present author. It follows logically that if universalism is a true doctrine, then a discussion of immersion versus no immersion is ultimately non-sensical.
II. Contemporary Universalism Also Entails a Non-Biblical View of the Nature of God which is Inseparable from the New Views of Revelation
(Not Content but the Encounter of Persons)
What is God like? How can we know the nature of God? The contemporary universalists maintain that He is love, but what does this mean? If revelation is not content or information (re: Scriptures), how do they know that God is love in the sense that His love necessarily entails the salvation of every man? No biblically oriented Christian would deny that the love of God is necessary for our salvation, but would deny that it is the sufficient condition of our salvation. How do they know that all men will be saved? Where do the universalists obtain this information? We must take up the promethian task of challenging all universalists with the query how do you verify your assertion that the nature of God precludes that anyone can be lost, if you are cut loose from a rational view of revelation? If revelation is rational, i.e., propositions contained in the scripture, then we can assert that we know the nature of God is love, because the revelation provides this information, and at the same time gives us abundant evidence of the nature of the love of God. But is the biblical doctrine of love to be equated with the contemporary view of love as entailing the universal redemption of man? The Scripture speaks of both the love of God and the condemnation of the alien sinner. We would never find out from a critical study of the scripture texts that all men are saved, and that our sole responsibility is merely entailed in our telling them so. Quite the opposite is the case! One said to Jesus Lord, are they few that are saved? Though we believe the Bible is unique revelation, we are not here concerned with the mere proof-texting of biblical animosity toward universalism. We will choose a book which contains an extensive doctrine of the love of God, I John; and we now turn to learn what he has to say about the nature of the love of God. We will examine Johns theology of love to see if this section of scripture adheres to the contemporary theological definition of agape that is, that Gods love is of such a nature that no man not even the unrepentent sinner, will be eternally condemned. If we find that the Biblical doctrine love is not in harmony with the redefinition of agape by the theologians, then we can only say that their new view of the love of God stems from their new view of revelation, and therefore, stands in the sharpest tension with both the biblical doctrine of revelation, and the love of God revealed therein. John develops the first epistle around three basic tests of life fellowship, love, and belief. Though the entire epistle repudiates universalism, our immediate attention will be directed to the place of love in the life of redemption. John tells the universal church that He that loveth his brother abideth in the light, and there is no occasion of stumbling in him. (1Jn. 2:9-29 R.V.). John declares that only the ones who continue to love (present tense verb) continues to abide (Present tense verb) in the light. This entire work was written to give criterion for distinguishing between the redeemed and the unredeemed! He again raises his voice against the universalist message as he states, We know that we have passed out of death into life, because we love the brethren. He that loveth not abideth in death. (1Jn. 3:14, 1901 R.V.). The love of God obligates man to love; therefore, there is at least this condition, which must be fulfilled before the love of God is redemptive. In the great section on the test of love (Joh. 4:7-12) we are confronted with the demands of holy love. God is defined as agape or love! This sounds like what the contemporary theologians are saying, but here Gods redemptive love is conditioned. This becomes crystal clear in 1Jn. 4:12if we love one another, God abideth in us. . .. The condition which must be met, before God promises to continually dwell in the believer is clearly pointed out in Johns use of the conditional if we love one another. We love, because he first loved (1Jn. 4:19). This great paragraph on the love of God shows three things(1) That the love of God is not indiscriminately redemptive; (2) and that therefore the biblical doctrine of the love of God is not the doctrine of the love of God which the universalists teach; (3) the universalists agape theology must be the result of a new view of revelation, because it does not stem from the biblical theology of the love of God. This great sketch of scripture clearly demarcates the relation of the love of God to the problem of Sin, truly a problem fit for God! The two questions which we asked at the beginning of this section What is God Like? and How Can we Know the Nature of God? receive mutually exclusive answers in the Bible and in the works of contemporary universalist theologians.
We now turn to a third consideration some biblical doctrines which cannot be harmonized with the doctrine of the universal salvation.
III. There Are Many Biblical Doctrines Which Flatly Contradict the Doctrine of Universalism:
What do universalists reply to the biblical doctrines of the wrath and judgment of God? Marcian taught in the second century, that the Old Testament reveals solely a God of wrath and the New Testament solely a God of love. This assertion tells us more of the level of Marcians biblical knowledge than it does about the biblical teaching concerning the wrath of God. The locus classicus of the biblical doctrine of the wrath of God is Rom. 1:19-32. Here all of mankind is brought under the wrath of God. We must here assert what is very clear in the text that we are here reading of the objective wrath and not a subjective or emotive wrath.
The desert herald, John the Baptizer, thundered out these words to unrepented Pharisees and SadduceesYe offspring of vipers, who warned you to flee from the wrath to come the same time no one can take seriously the biblical records, and reduce the wrath and judgment of God to a present reality, emptying these doctrines of any future or eschatological impart. All judgment is not condemnatory in nature, but the biblical authors take special care to distinguish this fact from condemnatory judgment which will befall all who are not found in Christ. Paul provides us with the message of divine mercy Therefore, there is no condemnation to those that are in Christ Jesus. (Rom. 8:1).
The contemporary agape theologians have set aside the biblical doctrines of justice, righteousness, wrath, judgment as though they were not there or as though they are in irreconcilable tension with the biblical doctrine of the love of God. Why and how do they choose only a part of the biblical doctrine of the nature of God to the exclusion of other parts? The New Testament as does the Old, speaks of the justice, righteousness and love of God as though they are inseparable. Exegetically, universalism is untenable! How then can we account for the wide spread adherence to this doctrine by most top ranking theological eschalon? Contemporary theologians, controlled by alien philosophical and/or theological presuppositions, hold that these doctrines are contradictory.
Nicholas Berdyaev, the Russian Orthodox Existentialist, states that, The justification of hell on the ground of justice . . . is particularly revolting and lacking in spiritual depth (see p. 267 The Destiny of Man.) Berdyaev is actually claiming that the biblical teaching that God is love is precluding justice. The very work which gives this definition of God I John militates against Berdyaevs interpretation of the significance of the doctrinal assertion that God is love. John maintains that the nature of God as love obligates man if he is to be among the redeemed. John is no universalist, but Dr. Berdyaev is! You will have to choose which one you follow!
This new non-biblical view of the nature of God is clearly revealed in the universalism of C. H. Dodd. The nature and purpose of the atoning work of Christ receives radical alteration at the hands of some master theological surgeons. The new understanding of the nature of Christs atonement is a genetic abervation. Dr. Dodd was largely responsible for the change in translation from propitiation to expiation in the Revised Standard Version, and New English Bible, etc. What is the theological difference between these two terms? Expiation involves an atonement for a thing; propitiation involves atonement to a person! The contemporary theological foundation for favoring expiation is most apparent in the so-called agape theology: that God is love, and cannot and does not demand atonement to himself in order that reconciliation of the sinner can be effected. This idea is not only foreign to the New Testament, but rather it stands in diametric opposition to the biblical doctrine of atonement. The use of expiation in Rom. 3:25, etc., clearly reveals the contemporary attitude toward the nature of God; that Gods nature precludes His demand for propitiatory sacrifice. We must never cease from declaring that though Gods nature demanded propitiatory sacrifice; and that He was that sacrifice in the person of the Lamb of God! The biblical doctrine of the objective wrath of God, which leads to the condemnation of the person outside of Christ on the day of Judgment, has no place in a concept of atonement based on expiation. The apostolic declaration that new power became available to men in Christ is central for the biblical doctrine of Kerygma. What was the origin and extent of newness on the earth? What was the relation of Kerygma, and the source and power of newness? In the fulness of time God made available in Christ a new power to become sons of God. God made a new covenant with men and this covenant was inseparably related to the death of the testator the Christ of the Cross and empty tomb. (Hebrews 8, 9). This new covenant brought into possible existence a new life. This new quality of life transcends mere existence. Paul pictures the new life of one who has died to sin in Rom. 6:1-7. We are entombed with Christ by the instrument of baptism in order that we rise to walk in newness of life (Rev. 6:4). This beautiful section of scripture plainly reveals that this newness of life is conditioned; therefore, it is not indiscriminately available to all men as universalism asserts.
Newness of Life is made available to man through the preaching of the Cross. The paradox of The Skandalon (1Co. 1:18-25) is that it is the power of God only to those who are saved; it is a stumbling block to the Jews, who thought that there was some other way to be redeemed; it is foolishness to the Gentiles (nations or Greeks), because it was intellectually absurd that mans only possibility for salvation was made available through a crucified savior on an ignomenious cross. This new life was a separated life. Here the tension with universalism is sharply focused. This is no sacred-secular distinction; because of a re-interpretation of the kingdom and lordship of God based on a complete restoration of man to God. The newness of life is the quality of life available only to the new man. The Ephesian Epistle gives us a divine perspective from which to see the new man in Christ. The construction of the Church (chp. 2) was to destroy unwanted walls which divide the creation of God. That he might create in himself of the two one new man . . . and might reconcile them both in one body unto God through the cross (Eph. 2:15-16 R.V. 1901). In a burst of glory Paul discloses that the new man is not to walk as the Gentiles, and he admonishes us to put on the new man, that after God hath been created in righteousness and holiness of truth. (Eph. 4:24). His radical distinction between the old man and the new man clearly stands in opposition to the indistinguishable line between old and new man in universalism.
The new man makes up of the people of God. In universalism the whole earth is ushered into the kingdom indiscriminately, but the Scriptures speak of an elect race, a royal nation, a people for Gods own possession (1Pe. 2:9). The three adjectives elect, royal, and holy cry out against a complete restorationism. Beginning in the ancient records of Israel we take note of the development of a special people of God. The development culminated in the construction of the Church of Jesus Christ spiritual Israel (Romans, chp. 911). Christ himself demarcated two distinct groups of men the sheep and the goats. From the beginning to the end the Bible repudiates the doctrine that all men are children of God. The old liberal theologians spoke often about the universal fatherhood of God and brotherhood of man, and so do their successors, the contemporary preachers of universalism. In apostolic preaching the saving power of Christ was extended to all hereers as conditioned. But all who heard did not hear! The Paradox of seeing when they cannot see was illucidated by Isaiah (chp. 6) by Christ, (Mar. 4:10 f), and by Paul (Act. 28:26-28). All three declared that their hearers were conditioned by their cultural ears! But we must never forget that only those who hear and believe the same shall be saved.
That the Lordship of God, revealed in Christ, was conditionally set forth is clear from the first occasion of apostolic preaching. When Peter and the eleven finished holding high the magnificent master men cried Men and brethren, what must we do? (Act. 2:14 ff the word translated must is from the Greek dei which expresses all kinds of necessity). The reply came not that the love of God was unconditioned, but rather that the seeking sinner must do something to lay hold on eternal life. Peter said Repent! (This is in the imperative, or command mode.) Christ . . . except ye repent! He continued and declared and be baptized everyone of you. (This part of his reply is also in the imperative modebe baptized.) This was not a suggestion or a mere request, but a command! The results of obedience would bethe remission of sins and the gift of the Holy Spirit. After every example of Apostolic preaching men were challenged to decide for Christ. His saving power is available only to those who decided to stand without the gate and suffer with Christ. To decide for Christ means to cut through or away the possible alternative of denying His redemption.
There is no possible way to eliminate org from the Bible, even by the most radical critical surgery, only he who continues to the end the same shall be saved. The contemporary agape theologians manipulate the biblical data to fit into their theological molds which were formed by existentialists and phenomenological views of man, and the human situation, not the biblical doctrine of love, son, man, forgiveness, etc.
The raison dtre of the church is to evangelize all men everywhere, and bring them to saving knowledge of Christ. In the March 1st, 1963 edition of Christianity Today, Dr. Ferr graciously but vainly attempted to reply to Dr. Kuhns analysis of Dr. Ferrs view of universalism. Dr. Ferr quoted the Scriptures in his effort to show that universalism is clearly a biblical doctrine. Since this is not a self-evident claim, it would require extended critical discussion. (For a recent study of alleged Pauline universalism see Paul Munch, Paul and the Salvation of Mankind. This is an excellent refutation of supposed Pauline Universalism).
Dr. Ferrs universalism is clearly delineated in his statement to attribute eternal hell to God is literal blasphemy, the attributing of the worst to the best. From such blasphemy may God deliver everyone. p. 24, Christianity Today, March 1, 1963. It must be apparent that what constitutes blasphemy and the nature of God, according to Jr. Ferr, has not been vouch-safed in the Scripture, but if at all, through some other revelatory medium unknown to most of us. Contemporary universalism is merely voicing again the words of a Dostoevskian archangel who has reappeared in our midst, and bids all men give him ear. I refuse my mission if the torture of an innocent child by the brute is to be the ransom of the world. Often, neither the thoughts of men nor archangels voice the word and will of God! The time of the tyranny of words is again upon us! The revelation of God declares against the indiscriminate redemption of man; and the voice of the theological oracles echo and re-echo that redemption of all men is a fact go and declare it. The oracles of our age of naturalistic humanism are declaring that man is the absolute. Man is infatuated with himself and is seriously ill with self love, like Goethes Werther.
Bertrand Russell said that the only thing that would save western civilization is Christian love; but he too wants Christian love without Gods Christ. The gulf of guilt has been bridged, but only for those in Christ! The Hound of Heaven is seeking the lost, and it is His love that persistswhile human hybris (pride) intensifies, Francis Thompson gives us thrilling insight into the nature of the love of God: a God who loves sinners, and judges the unrepentant, has announced in His Word that the unredeemed will be lost. Let us retrace the steps of The Hound of Heaven as we challenge every hearer to receive Christ as Lord of life and death, time and eternity. These steps are strewn with the tears of Christ who came to be our saviour, and who will, if necessary, come again to be our judge. Not everyone who sayeth unto me Lord, Lord will enter into the Kingdom of God but he that doeth (present tense keeps on doing) the will of my Father who is in heaven. Many will say to me in that day, Lord, Lord, did we not prophecy by thy name and by thy name cast out demons, and by thy name do many mighty works? And then will I profess unto them, I never knew you: depart from me, ye that work iniquity. Mat. 7:21-23, R.V., 1901).
CONCEPT OF RESTORATION OF ALL THINGS IN THE KERYGMA
A Study in Biblical Theology Outline Taken from Union Theological Seminary, Richmond, Virginia, Curtis Pollok Harper Jr., May, 1958. T.H.M. Thesis
Consummation of Gods Purpose for
Man and the Rest of Creation
I.
Proclaimation of Restoration
Old Testament Prophecy of Restoration
1.
Isa. 65:17-25
2.
Isa. 35:1-10
3.
Eze. 47:1-12
4.
Amo. 9:8-10
5.
Hos. 2:18-23
6.
Isa. 11:1-5
7.
Genesis 1-3
II.
New Testament Teaching
1.
Rom. 8:18-23
2.
1Co. 15:36-49
3.
2Pe. 3:3-13
4.
Rev. 20:11 to Rev. 21:1 Rev. 22:5
5.
Act. 3:18
6.
Eph. 1:10
Apokatastasis Pantn Reconcile Completely, refer to Joh. 1:1-4 come to own (things neuter plural back again)
III.
1.
Reconciliation of Persons
2.
Reconciliation of Cosmos
3.
Reconciliation implies previous estrangement!
Prefix do again. Anakephalaisasthai to sum up all things in Christ.
Eph. 1:10
Col. 1:20
IV.
Pattern of Restoration
1.
First Prophets
2.
Apostles Preaching
3.
Pauline Epistles Ephesians and Colossians
4.
Revelation of John
Fuente: College Press Bible Study Textbook Series
(12-14) And I beheld . . .Better, And I saw when He opened the sixth seal, and (omit lo!) a great shaking took place, and the sun became black as sackcloth of hair, and the moon all became as blood, and the stars of the heaven fell to the earth, as a fig-tree casts its winter figs when shaken by a great wind, and the heaven departed like a scroll being rolled up, and every mountain and island were moved out of their places. It is well to keep in mind the parallel imagery of the Old Testament. The shaking (earthquake is hardly an adequate rendering, as the shaking extends to heaven as well as earth) was spoken of by Haggai: Yet once for all (not once more, as in the English version) shake I not the earth only, but also the heavens. And this word Once for all signifieth the removing of those things that are shaken (Hag. 2:6, and Heb. 12:26-27). Sun black as sackcloth: Joel has a similar thought the sun shall be turned into darkness (Joe. 2:30-31); and Isaiah, I clothe the heavens with blackness, and I make sackcloth their covering (Isa. 1:3). The moon as blood is repeated from Joe. 2:30-31. The falling of the stars of heaven has its parallel in Isa. 34:3-4, All the host of heaven shall be dissolved. As a fig-tree is an echo of Isa. 34:4. It will be seen by these passages how closely the writer of the Apocalypse has kept to Old Testament imagery; and that events, such as great calamities, changes, and revolutions in the worlds history, are described by emblems similar to those used here. St. Peter, for example, illustrates the great spiritual revolution of the Day of Pentecost by the passage from Joel, The sun turned into darkness and the moon into blood. Hence it seems right to regard the language here as figurative, and to bear in mind that, though its fullest application belongs to the final advent, there may be many anticipatory advents. The judgment is often rehearsed before the day of judgment; the ages of oppression end in a day of catastrophe and confusion in which the righteous laws of a righteous King avenge themselves on the law breakers; the old lights and landmarks are for a time obliterated, and feeble, but pretentious, religionists are swept off as autumn figs from the fig-tree, and the proud and mighty are dismayed; things come to a crisis, and men are proven by the hour of that judgment; the unripe or untimely fruit drops off, as those who have no root in themselves fall away, and as the feebly- founded house fell in the tempest (Mat. 7:26-27). If this be so in the minor and preliminary crisis of the world, how much more so in the final crisis, which will try all? Let him that thinketh he standeth take heed lest he fall. The untimely figs, or unripe figs, are the grosses, or winter figs, which grow under the leaves, and do not ripen at the proper season, but hang upon the trees till the winter. They are a fit emblem of those who have not used the opportunity and season to ripen for God. Like the unwise virgins, they have not replenished their lamps with oil; or, to use the unique expression of St. Luke, they bring no fruit to perfection (Luk. 8:14). The crisis thus puts the feeble, timid, and negligent to the test, and also proves the vanity of those who make any world-power their confidence. As the day of the Lord of which Isaiah spoke was upon every one that was proud and lifted up, upon the cedars and oaks, upon the towers and fenced walls, upon the loftiness and haughtiness of men, so does the Apocalyptic seer behold the dismay which falls upon every form of vain gloriousness, pretence, and pride.
Fuente: Ellicott’s Commentary for English Readers (Old and New Testaments)
(12-17) The sixth seal.The seals follow the lines laid down by our Lord in Matthew 24. There He tells His disciples that wars (Rev. 6:6), famines and pestilences (Rev. 6:7), and persecutions (Rev. 6:9) are to be expected; these are necessary features in the history of the world. But these features are described by our Master as preliminary to His Coming and the end of the world (Mat. 24:3), and that when these had wrought their work then the Coming of the Son of Man would take place (Mat. 24:29-31). With this guide, it is impossible for us to deny that the opening of this sixth seal has reference to the Coming of the Son of Man, and finds its final and ultimate fulfilment in the day when He will come to gather His elect from the four winds. But it is not to be forgotten that our Lord wished us to regard certain great culminating epochs as in a secondary sense His advents. The eagles which swept down upon the carcase of any corrupt nationality were proofs of His reign and true shadows of His coming. The features indicated in the seals have a sequence which has been reproduced in the history of nations and churches. The promise of good; the breaking forth of the spirit of violence; the time of social misery, want, disease; the oppression of the good; revolution these have repeated themselves in Jewish, Roman, French, and other histories; and the prophecy is not exhausted yet.
Fuente: Ellicott’s Commentary for English Readers (Old and New Testaments)
Sixth seal Final earthly DISSOLUTION AND DOOM, Rev 6:12-17.
12. And ”The interpretation of the sixth seal,” says Alford truly, “is a crucial point in apocalyptic exegesis. We may unhesitatingly set down all interpretations as wrong which view as the fulfilment of this passage any period except the coming of the Lord.” The parallel passages are Mat 24:29-35; Mat 25:31-46. Hengstenberg’s objection, that the resurrection and other things are omitted, is equally true of both these passages. No one picture in Scripture of the final day is complete. The completion must be attained by a blending of cognate passages.
A great earthquake The Greek word for earthquake does not limit the quake to the earth, but implies a concussion which, as here, may include heaven as well as earth.
Sun moon On their obscuration by the atmospheric commotions of the day of dissolution, see our note on Mat 24:29.
Black as sackcloth The cilicium, on which see note, Act 18:3.
Fuente: Whedon’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments
‘And I saw when he opened the sixth seal, and there was a great earthquake, and the sun became black as sackcloth of hair, and the whole moon became as blood, and the stars of the heaven fell to the earth, as a fig tree casts its unripe figs when it is shaken by a great wind. And the heaven was removed as a scroll when it is rolled up, and every mountain and every island were moved out of their places. And the kings of the earth, and the princes, and the chief captains, and the rich and the strong, and every bondman and every freeman, hid themselves in the caves and in the rocks of the mountains.’
The question to be decided here is how we are to approach the interpretation of this type of language. Are the events described here to be interpreted politically and apocalyptically as mainly events leading up to the Great Day, or are they to be seen as natural events describing that final great day itself? On a literal reading the latter may seem the case. But the language is apocalyptic, and cannot be taken literally. All the stars cannot fall to earth – the earth is not large enough, and if heaven was removed as a scroll how could the sun and moon still be there? Furthermore the prophets used similar language of events in their own day describing political upheaval (and thus not to be interpreted literally), possibly but not necessarily accompanied in some cases by signs in the heavens – see Appendix below. They used such language to give an impression of world shaking events. And stars falling from heaven are elsewhere used of angelic activity. Thus that may be the case here.
We should remember that throughout this chapter John is following the pattern of Jesus discourses in Matthew 24; Mark 13; Luke 21. And at this point in His discourse Jesus used language like this, a use which we have argued above was describing the political upheaval around the time of the destruction of Jerusalem in 70 AD. So John may be saying that great political tumult and great supernatural activity (revealed more fully later on, especially in the fifth and sixth trumpets) are to occur.
‘There was a great earthquake’. Jesus had forecast ‘and earthquakes’ (Mat 24:7). A similar event happened at the resurrection of Christ (Mat 28:2), and great earthquakes are forecast to take place through the ages (Luk 21:11), as are world-shaking events which could be described in such apocalyptic language with regard to sun, moon and stars. The Old Testament prophets spoke of them in similar language as happening in their day (see Appendix below). Such events are often seen as presaging awesome things to come. And men have regularly hid from them saying that God’s day has come. In one sense therefore the first part of the sixth seal could be seen as having taken place again and again. But the difference here is that we are to see all this as pointing forward to a climax, to the actual final occurrence when that Day does actually come. Here John is not describing only the potential, he is describing the actual.
An earthquake is mentioned in Rev 8:5 when the trumpets are about to sound in John’s day. A great earthquake is also mentioned as occurring in Jerusalem (Rev 11:13 compare ‘where also their Lord was crucified’ – Rev 11:8) as a kind of pre-emptive strike as the last judgment commences, and finally one occurs among ‘the cities of the nations’ (Rev 16:19), the latter the greatest ever. They all signify God’s wrath.
. In Rev 8:5 the earthquake preceded the seven trumpets and their great devastation and judgment, in Rev 11:13 and Rev 16:19 it is part of the great judgment day itself. Each introduces divine activity. Here it is seen as preceding the signs in the Heavens, which are either manifestations of that last judgment or apocalyptic pictures of the world’s turmoil which lead to that final judgment. Every earthquake is thus intended to be a reminder of the coming judgment of God, and the same applies here. This one is clearly to be seen as very severe, and as also preparing the way for divine activity. (The message is not diminished by the fact that we now know the main cause of earthquakes. It was God Who made the world that way).
The fact that ‘every mountain and every island were moved out of their places’ is a vivid eyewitness description of an earthquake. It demonstrates the greatness of the particular earthquake being described, so that John may well possibly have seen it as then causing the other natural phenomena. Its results would thus include the blackening out of the sun, the moon appearing like blood through the dust and debris thrown up, and the blotting out of the stars so that they appear to have fallen from heaven. It may then be seen as the last earthquake itself. (There is no mention of the vicinity in which the earthquake was to take place). Furthermore the description of falling stars may also suggest its connection with a meteor or asteroid, breaking up in its descent, appearing like falling stars (‘shooting stars’), with the other stars blacked out, and which could well cause a great earthquake and bring about the final devastation. This would be to interpret literally to a large extent.
On the other hand stars falling from Heaven regularly reflect angelic activity in Revelation. The phrase here almost exactly parallels that in Rev 9:1 where it is clear an angel is in mind, and we can also compare Rev 12:4. So it may be political turmoil that is in mind here combined with supernatural events, occurring through history and leading up to the final judgment (such events as are described later). (See Appendix below for a more detailed treatment of apocalyptic language).
Such events, of course, have happened throughout history in different parts of the world, from the first century onwards pointing forward to the final day. Thus each large earthquake has reminded men of the great judgment day that is coming and has turned the thoughts of many to the day of judgment. And each age has experienced tumultuous political events and spiritual attack that could be described in this fashion. But the description here is, in the last analysis, of the ultimate.
As we have said there is no indication where this earthquake actually takes place and whether it is universal. So in men’s minds it could equally have applied to any large scale earthquake that has taken place when terrified people indeed took refuge in caves and mountains (it does not say the kings of the whole earth), and where men’s hearts cried out in fear. Each was one more indicator in preparation for the coming of Christ, and indeed could have been seen, as far as the participants were concerned, as the last. John is not in the business of forecasting the future in detail as such. The purpose of Revelation is not so much to forecast events as to prepare God’s people for them. He is concerned to prepare them for what they and the world have to face. ‘There will be earthquakes’. But then one day the last great earthquake will occur. And then His day will come.
So we have to consider the real possibility that at least part of the phenomena described here, if not all, are to be interpreted mainly politically as describing apocalyptic events leading up to the final day. As a whole the description parallels the words of our Lord Himself in His apocalyptic discourse, ‘the sun shall be darkened and the moon shall not give her light, and the stars shall fall from heaven, and the powers of the heavens shall be shaken’ (Mat 24:29; Mar 13:24-25), which were not there directly connected with an earthquake, and which Luke explains for his Gentile readers as, ‘there will be signs in sun, and moon, and stars, and on the earth distress of nations in perplexity, for the roaring of the sea and the billows, men fainting for fear, and for expectation of things which are coming on the world, for the powers of the heaven shall be shaken’ and Jesus saw this as being fulfilled within a generation. Thus even the earthquake may also be mainly political rather than physical.
As we have seen earlier (beginning of chapter 6), such are the continual parallels between this chapter and Jesus’ apocalyptic discourse that dependence of this whole chapter on the words of our Lord cannot really be doubted, and Jesus Himself specifically said that the generation of His disciples would not pass away until all He described was accomplished, including signs similar to these. If we are to be honest we must not avoid the plain meaning of His words just to support our theories.
(Greek is a wonderful language in the hands of expositors, and the most obscure uses of words can be called on so as to make it fit into our theories. And we are all guilty of it. But we must beware of so treating the word of God. Jesus did describe all these things as happening as a build up to the destruction of the Temple in 70 AD within that generation, and happen they did. That was not describing some far future ‘day of the Lord’, it was describing current world events).
John, however, is not referring specifically to that time spoken of by Jesus. He is extending the significance of the words. These things will go on, he is saying. 70 AD was not the end. The Jews have been scattered among the Gentiles as Jesus foretold, enduring great tribulation and ‘wrath unto this people’ (Luk 21:23). And the world will yet experience tumult among the nations and the wrath of God just as they did in Old Testament days as described by the prophets and in the days of the destruction of Jerusalem. The very people to whom he was writing lived among those who had yet to experience more of it.
(To John, looking forward to the second coming, although aware that it may be delayed (Joh 21:22) the idea is that these events will take place within the gap between his writing and the second coming. He had no idea how long that gap might be although aware that it might be a long time – ‘a thousand years’ (Rev 20:4).)
In the chapters to come we will learn more of such effects in sun, moon and stars, with stars falling from Heaven, and the powers of Heaven indeed being shaken. These will be revealed in the events following the opening of the seventh seal as happening throughout history. What happened to Jerusalem in 70 AD was a precursor to further terrible events for nations, which could all be described in these words. But all are but preparation for the final terrible end of the age events.
We have seen much of this in the opening of the first five seals. The first five seals began in John’s day and have continued on through history, resulting in false Messiahs, war, famine, wholesale death, persecution. Many a time portents must have been read in the heavens. But now the sixth seal, which illustrates to us men’s terror in the face of natural events and political tumult, describes the continuation of those events and brings us up to the final day of reckoning, the day of the wrath of the Lamb. It is an addition to the cataclysm of history when everything heads up to final climax, a situation for which there have been many rehearsals. Each age has at times thought that the time had come. Now it has come!
Up to this point in time the events of all the five seals have been continuing in parallel through history, and, as we shall indicate, in relative parallel with the first five trumpets and the first five bowls yet to be described. But what is happening through history in the opening of these five seals (and in the contemporaneous blowing of the trumpets and the emptying of the bowls) continues, and finalises, in the sixth seal, in the Day of the Wrath of God and of the Lamb. It is the sixth in each series, the sixth seal, the sixth trumpet and the sixth bowl, that introduces the closing events of the age. (In contrast the opening of the seventh seal will issue in the blowing of the trumpets which themselves also lead us up to this final day of reckoning, while the seventh trumpet and the seventh bowl themselves describe the final judgment).
Fuente: Commentary Series on the Bible by Peter Pett
The Opening of the Sixth Seal ( Rev 6:12-17 ).
The Sixth Seal Opened: Cosmic Disturbances – In Rev 6:12-17 we read about the opening of the sixth seal. This series of events may represent the beginning of the great Tribulation Period upon the earth, which starts with a great earthquake. This view is supported by the closing verse of this passage, “For the great day of his wrath is come.” (Rev 6:17) In addition, it is not inconceivable that Rev 6:15 is referring to the Rapture of the Church, which takes place at the beginning of the Tribulation Period. We know that Jesus’ resurrection took place at the time of a great earthquake (Mat 28:2).
Mat 28:2, “And, behold, there was a great earthquake: for the angel of the Lord descended from heaven, and came and rolled back the stone from the door, and sat upon it.”
Rev 6:12 And I beheld when he had opened the sixth seal, and, lo, there was a great earthquake; and the sun became black as sackcloth of hair, and the moon became as blood;
Rev 6:13 Son 1:5, “I am black, but comely, O ye daughters of Jerusalem, as the tents of Kedar, as the curtains of Solomon.”
The description given here in Revelation of “the sun became black as sackcloth of hair, and the moon became as blood” can be created by a solar and lunar eclipse. When the moon passes between the sun and the earth, a full solar eclipse can be created causing the day becoming dark, because the sun is overshadowed by the moon. Thus, “the sun shall be turned into darkness.”
A lunar eclipse is created when the earth passes between the sun and the moon. In a normal lunar eclipse, the moon has the dark shadow of the earth passing across it, just as in a solar eclipse. On January 9, 2001, a lunar eclipse offered spectacular show, turning the moon to a blood red. This happened because a decade before in 1991, Mount Pinatubo erupted in a volcanic explosion in the Philippines. Ten years later, the debris thrown up by this volcanic eruption was still in the atmosphere. It reduced the amount of light that was being transmitted from the sun to the moon, and passing by the earth. This light diffusion caused the moon to turn an orange color as the light from the sun was bent and filtered by the earth’s atmosphere. Thus, “the moon shall be turned into blood.” [71]
[71] “Space Lunar Eclipse Offers Spectacular Show,” (CNN.com, January 9, 2001) [on-line]; accessed 17 May 2009; available from http://www.cnn.com/2001/ASIANOW/east/01/10/china.space.ap/index.html; Internet.
The amount of debris in the atmosphere will determine the amount of light diffusion, thus determining the color of the moon. This will be a time on earth when earthquakes and volcanic eruptions will be frequent and enormous (Mat 24:7). Therefore, a darkened sun and a blood red moon is not hard to imagine under these circumstances.
Rev 6:13 And the stars of heaven fell unto the earth, even as a fig tree casteth her untimely figs, when she is shaken of a mighty wind.
Rev 6:13 [72] E. W. G. Masterman, “Fig, Fig Tree,” in International Standard Bible Encyclopedia, ed. James Orr (Grand Rapids, Michigan: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., c1915, 1939), in The Sword Project, v. 1.5.11 [CD-ROM] (Temple, AZ: CrossWire Bible Society, 1990-2008).
Scripture Reference – Note a similar verse:
Isa 34:4, “And all the host of heaven shall be dissolved, and the heavens shall be rolled together as a scroll: and all their host shall fall down, as the leaf falleth off from the vine, and as a falling fig from the fig tree .”
Rev 6:14 And the heaven departed as a scroll when it is rolled together; and every mountain and island were moved out of their places.
Rev 6:14 “Indeed, if ye but knew how close I am standing to the ‘curtain of time’, ye would draw very near and be filled with expectancy. For one of these days so very soon the curtain shall be drawn; the heavens shall be rolled back; the canopy of the ‘sky’ as ye know it shall be lifted away, and the Son of Man shall be revealed in power and great glory” [73]
[73] Frances J. Roberts, Come Away My Beloved (Ojai, California: King’s Farspan, Inc., 1973), 62.
Scripture Reference – Note a similar verse:
Isa 34:4, “And all the host of heaven shall be dissolved, and the heavens shall be rolled together as a scroll : and all their host shall fall down, as the leaf falleth off from the vine, and as a falling fig from the fig tree.”
Rev 6:14 Comments – It is not inconceivable that Rev 6:14 is referring to the Rapture of the Church.
The Sixth Seal Rev 6:12 to Rev 7:17 describes the events surrounding the opening of the sixth seal. The opening of this seal brings enormous cosmic disturbances upon the earth (Rev 6:12-17). During this event, God seals the remnant of Israel (Rev 7:1-8). In the midst of these cosmic disturbances, multitudes of people will be saved (Rev 7:9-17).
Outline Here is a proposed outline:
1. The Sixth Seal Opened Rev 6:12-17
2. Israel is Sealed Rev 7:1-8
3. Those Saved in the Tribulation Rev 7:9-17
The opening of the sixth seal:
v. 12. And I beheld when He had opened the sixth seal, and, lo, there was a great earthquake; and the sun became black as sackcloth of hair, and the moon became as blood;
v. 13. and the stars of heaven fell unto the earth, even as a fig-tree casteth her untimely figs when she is shaken of a mighty wind.
v. 14. And the heaven departed as a scroll when it is rolled together; and every mountain and island were moved out of their places.
v. 15. And the kings of the earth and the great men and the rich men and the chief captains and the mighty men and every bondman and every free man hid themselves in the dens and in the rocks of the mountains,
v. 16. and said to the mountains and rocks, Fall on us, and hide us from the face of Him that sitteth on the throne, and from the wrath of the Lamb;
v. 17. for the great day of His wrath is come, and who shall be able to stand?
There is an obvious agreement here with Mat 24:1-51, where the Lord speaks of the signs and wonders which would precede the Judgment and the end of the world. For although not all the scenes of Judgment are here included, yet the most important ones stand out plainly: And I saw when He opened the sixth seal, and a great earthquake happened, and the sun became black as sackcloth, and the full moon became like blood, and the stars of heaven fell to the earth, as a fig-tree casts her figs when shaken by a mighty wind. With the opening of the sixth seal by the Lamb the special signs which should usher in the last day were enacted before the eyes of John. There was a great and terrible earthquake, Luk 21:11; the sun and the moon were darkened, Joe 2:31; Mat 24:29; the stars fell down from the firmament, Mat 24:29; all nature was in an uproar, the universe was disintegrating. And still more: And the heaven was removed like a rolled-up scroll, and every mountain and island was displaced from its location. The firmament of the heavens, apparently secure for eternity, will not escape in the last great disturbances of the universe. Just as a roll of parchment is rolled up and laid aside, so the firmament will be removed. And at the same time the solid mountains that have withstood the storms of centuries, and the islands that have defied the billows of untold hurricanes, will be displaced, set aside, as no longer needed.
What effect this would have on the people of the world is also shown: And the kings of the earth and the mighty ones and the generals and the wealthy and the strong ones and every slave and freeman hid themselves in the caves and in the rocks of the mountains, and said to the mountains and the rocks, Fall upon us and hide us from the face of Him that sits upon the throne, and from the wrath of the Lamb; for the great day of Their wrath has come, and who is able to stand? Here the terror and despair of the enemies of the Lord, of which He Himself has prophesied, is delineated. On the last great day the defiant authority of the proud rulers of the world, of kings and mighty ones and generals, will sink into the dust, and they will seek respite and deliverance like the lowest of their subjects. Then all the wealth of the earth will not buy salvation, and the strength of a thousand oxen will not effect escape. Then the slaves and the freemen will be on the same level, and no man will think of social distinctions. And they all, filled with unspeakable dread, will cower in abject terror and fly to the crags and caves of the mountains, vainly hoping to find a spot where the angry glances of the holy God will not strike them, where the wrath of the Lamb, whose sacrifice they rejected in their unbelief, will not find them. That is what the breaking of the sixth seal uncovered: the terrors of the godless world on the day of the Judgment of God. Only the Christians, certain of the atonement of Christ which they have accepted by faith, will rejoice on that day, knowing that their redemption is nigh.
Summary
As the Lamb opens six of the seven seals on the scroll in. the hand of God, some of the tribulations and persecutions of the last days of the world are exhibited, culminating in the terrors of the last day, but also the deliverance of the martyrs, with the promise that God would vindicate his holiness.
Rev 6:12-17. I beheld when he had opened the sixth seal, &c. The sixth seal or period produces mighty changes and revolutions, which, according to the prophetic style, are expressed by great commotions in the earth, and in the heavens. The very same images, the very same expressions are used by the other prophets concerning the mutations and alterations of religions and governments; and why may they not therefore, with equal propriety and fitness, be applied to one of the greatest and most memorable revolutions that ever was in the world,the subversion of the Heathen religion, and establishment of the Christian, which was begun by Constantine the Great, and completed by his successors? The series of the prophesy requires this application, and all the phrases and expressions will easily admit it. And I beheld when he had opened the sixth seal, (Rev 6:12.) and lo, there was a great earthquake, or rather a great concussion, ( ); for the word comprehends the shaking of the heavens as well as of the earth. The same phrase is used, Hag 2:6; Hag 2:21 concerning the first coming of Christ; and this shaking, as the apostle says, Heb 12:27 signifieth the removing of those things which are shaken; and so the prophet Haggai explains it. And where was ever a greater concussion, or removal, than when Christianity was advanced to the throne of Paganism, and idolatry gave placetothetruereligion? Then follow the particular effects of this general concussion, Rev 6:12-14. Isaiah speaks much in the same manner concerning Babylon and Idumea, ch. Isa 13:10 and Isa 34:4.; and Jeremiah concerning the land of Judah, ch. Jer 4:23-24; and Ezekiel concerning Egypt, ch. Eze 32:17.; and Joel concerning Jerusalem, ch. Joe 2:10; Joe 2:31.; and our Saviour himself also concerning the destruction of Jerusalem, Mat 24:29. Now, it is certain, that the fall of any of these cities or kingdoms was not of greater concern and consequence to the world, nor more deserving to be described in such sublime figures, than the fall of the Pagan Roman empire, when the great lights of the Heathen worldthe sun, moon, and stars,the powers civil and ecclesiastical, were all eclipsed and obscured; the Heathen emperors and Caesars were slain, the Heathen priests and augurs were extirpated, the Heathen officers and magistrates were removed, and their temples were demolished. It is customary with the prophets, after they have described a thingin the most symbolical and figurative diction, to represent the same again in plainer language; and the same method is observed here, Rev 6:15-17.; and the kings of the earth, &c. that is, Maximin, Galerius, Maxentius, Licinius, &c. with all their adherents and followers, were so routed and dispersed, that they hid themselves in dens, &c. expressions used, as in other prophets, (Isa 19:21. Hos 10:8. Luk 23:30.) to denote the utmost terror and consternation. This is therefore a triumph of Christ over his Heathen enemies, and a triumph after a severe persecution; so that the time and all the circumstances, as well as the series and order of the prophesy, agree perfectly with this interpretation. Galerius, Maximin, and Licinius, made even a public confession of their guilt, recalled their decrees and edicts against the Christians, and acknowledged the just judgments of God in their own destruction. The reader, desirous to enter more fully into the meaning of this wonderful chapter, will do well to consult the cotemporary historians; as it is impossible, in the compass of notes like these, to mark out all the particulars which well deserve observation. Mr. Burton observes upon this chapter, that “as commentators have been differently affected by reading the account of the apocalyptical visions, so they have struck out applications of various events to them. The very doubts of those, much better qualified to judge of these things than I dare presume to be, are sufficient to impose a silence upon me with regard to the application of particular events. Time, the grand revealer of all secrets, must unravel the deep mystery of these wonders. We have as yet but a dawn of those important truths, to lead us on from strength to strength; we must at present, like the wondering Israelites, stand still, and see the salvation of the Lord: in the mean time, it becomes us to seek after him, if haply we may find him. The general plan of the Revelation is evidently marked out to us as a solid foundation; and some strong outlines already appear, though at a distance from us, to shew that a beautiful and well-proportioned superstructure is now opening to our view, whose Builder and Maker is God. As far as reason will justify our application, and we derive our knowledge from the holy scripture, that pure fountain of all human knowledge, our conduct is safe and commendable; but we no sooner lose sight of that, than we become vain in our imaginations, and our foolish heart is darkened. The seven seals, in this chapter, seem tohave the apocalyptical number seven for a ground-work, from which to calculate the rise of their several events, and of their completions. But I am inclinable to think, that both the sixth and seventh seals are yet to be opened; since, from the apocalyptical descriptions given in this chapter, they seem to be reserved for those dreadful events which are to be revealed in the very last day, and which exceed our past experiences as much as they do the strength of our imagination.”We will conclude our notes on this chapter with Mr. Lowman’s remark, “that this part of historyis very proper to the general design of the whole Revelation;to support the patience, and encourage the perseverance of the church, by such an instance of God’s power and faithfulness in the protection of the Christian religion, and punishment of its enemies. We see in this period, during the persecution of Heathen Rome, the church in a state of trial and suffering, yet preserved and protected, and finally obtaining a state of peace and safety, when all the power of their persecutors was totally destroyed by God’s over-ruling providence. Thus this history verifies the general truth of all the prophecies, and the particular predictions of each of them severally:astrongencouragement to the patience and constancy of the true church!”
Inferences.To whatever event the seals may refer, it is certain, that the representations here made are very awful, and very instructive. Let us consider ourselves as invited to come up and see, and let us observe the memorable spectacle with attention. Let the view of the white horse, and his rider, who went forth conquering and to conquer, lead us to reflect on the peaceful purposes of our blessed Saviour’s appearance, and the rapidity of his conquests; and engage us frequently to pray for the further prosperity of his kingdom, that kingdom of righteousness, love, and happiness. When we think of the terrible effects of war, of famine, and of pestilence, represented by the three following hordes, and their riders here mentioned, let it excite our thankfulness, that not one of this dreadful triumvirate is comparatively sent forth against us in our land, though our national crimes have indeed deserved that they should invade us with united terrors; that peace should be entirely taken from our land, that our bread and water should be received by weight and measure, and that the dead should lie unburied in our streets, the food of the fowls of heaven, and the beasts of the earth: nor can any thing more justly excite our gratitude and thankfulness, than that the terrors and the guilt of sanguinary persecution are not to be found in the midst of us. The history of its horrors and ravages in other nations, and in other ages, may sometimes be an exercise of our faith; and we may be ready to cry out with the souls under the altar, How long, O Lord, holy and true, wilt thou not avenge the blood of thy saints upon the earth? But let us wait with patience; let us not form a hasty and inconsiderate judgment. The dead, who die in the Lord, and those who have been persecuted to death for his sake, and in his cause, are incomparably more happy than those who are the happiest among the living. The white robes, and golden crowns, with which they are adorned, are an abundant compensation, not only for every lighter suffering, but even for the slow fire, and the rack, those most dreadful instruments of torture. And though their malicious and implacable enemies may bitterly insult over them for a while, yet the triumphing of the wicked is for a short time, their guilty spirits will soon be summoned before the great Avenger of blood; and the day is coming when they shall be publicly brought forth, to suffer the utmost demands of his justice; even that day, when all the figurative descriptions here used shall be fully answered, in their literal meaning; when the sun shall indeed be turned into darkness, and the moon into blood; when the volume of heaven shall be rolled up as a scroll, and its stars shall fall from their orbs. It is no wonder, that ungodly sinners fly from this alarming and tremendous scene with wild consternation and confusion; no wonder, that they rend the very heavens with their cries, and call upon the mountains to fall upon them, and the rocks to cover them: for O! what were the sudden and irresistible crush of a rock, or a mountain, when compared with the weight of the wrath of the Lamb, and with the fire and brimstone of this second death. O! that by the expectation of this awful day, men of all ranks and conditions may be influenced to make their application to him, while he yet appears in the displays of his grace and mercy; to kiss the Son, lest he be angry, and they perish from the way, even when his wrath is only beginning to be kindled. (Psa 2:12.)
REFLECTIONS.1st, The six first seals contain the events relative to the church under the Heathen emperors, till, in the reign of Constantine, Paganism was utterly subverted, about the year 323.
On the Lamb’s opening the first seal, one of the living creatures, with a voice loud as the thunder, summoned the apostle’s attention, and bade him come and see the vision. When, lo! a white horse appeared, and one sat thereon, carrying a bow, and a crown on his head; and he went forth conquering and to conquer. This, in a spiritual sense, represents the ministration of the gospel, which brings joy, and peace, and triumph to the soul, of which the white horse may be considered as an emblem. The bow of Jesus, like that of Jonathan, returns not empty: the arrows of the gospel, through the power of the Spirit, become effectual to subdue the souls of sinners: his crown may denote his victories and dignity: he must prevail: and, in spite of all opposition, his gospel shall go on conquering and to conquer; till in the hearts of his faithful servants every corruption is subdued; till throughout the world his truth is diffused; and to the latest ages he will continue his conquests, till the kingdoms of the earth shall become the kingdoms of the Lord and of his Christ. Hasten, O Lord, that happy day!
2nd, The second seal being opened, he has a summons repeated from the second living creature, to come and see. And behold, another horse which was red; and one armed with a sword sat thereon, to whom power was given to take peace from the earth. And this seems to prefigure the bloody wars which, during the reigns of Trajan and Adrian, consumed innumerable multitudes of Jews and Romans, the common persecutors of Christianity. Note; (1.) Persecutors of God’s people shall have blood given them to drink. (2.) The Lord can set his enemies at variance among themselves, and make often one wicked nation to be the scourge of his vengeance upon another.
3rdly, The third seal opens, and another summons bids him come and see; when, lo! a black horse, the emblem of famine, appeared, and one with a pair of balances sat on him; when one of the beasts cried, A measure of wheat for a penny, and three measures of barley for a penny; and see thou hurt not the oil and the wine. The famine would fall chiefly on the poor, who, for the price of a whole day’s labour, could but just procure bread for their subsistence. Note; When one judgment is not effectual to lead sinners to repentance, a second follows at its heels.
4thly, The fourth seal being opened, the fourth living creature bids him come and see: when, behold, a pale horse; death sat thereon, and the grave attended him to devour the corpses of the fallen; or hell, to receive their souls. By war, by famine, by pestilence, and the beasts of the earth, permission is given them to slay even the fourth part of the earth: and history informs us of the dreadful desolations which wasted the Roman empire, from the reign of Maximin to Dioclesian, in righteous vengeance for their bloody persecutions of the Christians. Note; (1.) Death marches as a conqueror through the earth; and, when attended with hell at his feet, is indeed the king of terrors. (2.) God’s quiver is never exhausted; and, when he contends, he must prevail.
5thly, On opening the fifth seal a new scene is disclosed. The souls of the martyrs, who had been slain for the word of God, and for the testimony which they held, appear at the altar of incense; and they unite in their fervent supplications, saying, How long, O Lord, holy and true, dost thou not display these perfections, and judge and avenge our blood on them that dwell on the earth? In answer to their prayer, and in token of their acceptance, white robes, the emblems of righteousness and honour, were given unto every one of them; and it was said unto them, that they should rest yet for a little season, patiently expecting their final triumphs over all their foes, until their fellow-servants also and their brethren, that should be killed as they were, should be fulfilled; and then a period should be put to the bloody persecutions of the Pagan emperors, by the accession of Constantine, about the year 323. Note; (1.) The blood of martyrs, and the sufferings of the persecuted, cry for vengeance to a holy God, and it will surely come upon the heads of their enemies. (2.) The time for the exercise of faith and patience is a little season; but the glory which shall follow, will be eternal.
6thly, On opening the sixth seal, a dreadful earthquake seemed to threaten universal destruction. The luminaries of heaven grew dark as sackcloth; the stars dropped from their spheres, as when the storm shakes down the untimely figs; the heaven itself departed as a scroll; every island and mountain fled affrighted; and universal consternation seized all ranks and degrees, from the king upon the throne to the meanest slave, who sought for shelter in dens and caves, and in their horror wished to be for ever covered under the rocks and mountains, from the face of him that sat upon the throne, and from the wrath of the Lamb; for now by woeful experience they felt his terrible vengeance, which they could neither fly from nor resist. Rev 6:12-17 . The sixth seal-vision. As the visions portrayed, Rev 6:3-8 , have presented the signs of his coming, announced by the Lord himself in his eschatological discourse (Mat 24:6 sqq.), and as, also, the fifth seal-vision stands in close connection with Mat 24:9 , so the sixth vision brings what is found in Mat 24:7 ( ), and especially the signs predicted in Mat 6:29 , which [2154] refer to the immediate entrance of the day of judgment itself. [2155] Incorrect, therefore, because of the connection with what precedes, not only does that explanation appear to be, according to which the entire description, Rev 6:12-17 , refers to the Jewish-Roman war, and the “great day of wrath,” Rev 6:17 , is regarded as nothing else than the destruction of Jerusalem; [2156] but, also, that which seems to be directly the opposite, yet which actually depends upon a similarly arbitrary treatment, as well as also, in many particular interpretations, the harmonious exposition of allegorizing expositors from Victorin. to Hengstenberg, [2157] who in the earthquake, the darkening of the sun, etc., find figurative prophecies of certain events pertaining to the development of the Church, etc. If the reference of the entire vision be limited to the destruction of Jerusalem, it is, of course, more natural in Rev 6:12 ( . . ., . . .) to think of an eclipse of the sun and moon at the time of Claudius, [2158] than, with Bhmer, to interpret sun and moon as prophecy and the law; but even Grot. cannot adequately represent the context, since he refers to the falling of the stars, Rev 6:13 , as a prognostic of terrible events derived from the notions of the time, and on ., . . ., he has to remark: “Because of thick clouds, the heavens cannot be seen.” [2159] In arbitrariness of allegorical interpretation, Bhmer [2160] vies with Victorin., Beda, Vitr., Hengstenb., etc. The earthquake, Rev 6:12 , is made to signify “great revolutions in political or ecclesiastical spheres;” [2161] the sun becoming black is intended to be “the blasphemed Christ,” [2162] “prophecy,” [2163] “worldly emperors and kings;” [2164] the blood-red moon, “the Church reddened by the blood of martyrs,” [2165] “the law,” [2166] “spiritual princes;” [2167] the fallen stars, “the fallen, exalted church-teachers,” [2168] the “Jews who desert the true Church for corrupt Judaism, which is signified by the earth;” [2169] the mountains and islands are “prophets and philosophical pursuits,” [2170] etc. The whole refers, according to Vitr., to the destruction of the papal dominion, and the fearful disturbances in the political governments of Europe which were attached to the Papacy. [2171] Hengstenb. is distinguished from these interpreters only by indecision. The earthquake, the eclipse of sun and moon, the falling of the stars, etc., are to him figurative of “grievous and disturbed times,” which impend by God’s judgment over his enemies. “Heaven,” e.g., he says on Rev 6:13 , “is the heaven of princes, the entire magisterial and sovereign estate. The stars are individual princes and nobles.” This figurative explanation is regarded as necessary “because the falling from heaven of the stars, generally so called, would destroy every thing, while, in what follows, the races of the earth appear as still existing;” to which Ebrard objects: “The shaking down is only from the standpoint of the appearance to human vision; while the human eye sees the stars sinking as stars to earth, yet must they in reality sink, and pass far from the earth in the void expanse.”
[2154] Cf. Rev 6:16-17 , with Mat 24:30 sqq.; Luk 23:30 .
[2155] Cf. Ew., De Wette, Ebrard.
[2156] Grot., Wetst., Alcas., Herd., Bhmer.
[2157] Cf. Beda, N. de Lyra, Aret., Zeger, Vitr., etc.
[2158] Grot.
[2159] Cf. also Eich.
[2160] Cf. Alcas., etc.
[2161] Bhm., Vitr.
[2162] N. de Lyra, Aret.
[2163] Bhm.
[2164] Vitr.
[2165] N. de Lyra, Aret.
[2166] Bhm.
[2167] Vitr.
[2168] N. de Lyra, Aret., Vitr.
[2169] Bhm.
[2170] Aret.
[2171] Cf. Rev 16:17 sq.
The context itself should have been a sufficient protection from all these aberrations; for here, just as in the preceding seal-visions, the simple admonition is entirely valid, that every thing portrayed in Rev 6:12-17 is the subject of a vision, and not something objectively real. In the vision, John beholds as the stars fall to the earth ( . , not “in the expanse”). The consideration, how after such an event men can still live upon earth, is here utterly strange, and contrary to the context. For the sixth seal-vision concludes with the express testimony, that as also its entire contents, in harmony with Mat 24:27 sqq., indicate the day of final judgment has come, and is now present. [2172] 1 There is, therefore, actually, i.e., if that which was shown in Rev 6:12-17 in vision to the gazing prophet occurred at the end of days, no further life of the human race on this earth any longer possible, as, with the destruction of the world (Rev 6:12 sqq.), the day of the Lord begins. The signs are made known: . [2173] Already also the unbelieving note that the day of wrath has come (Rev 6:15 sqq.). It may accordingly be expected that the seventh seal is opened immediately after Rev 6:17 ; and thus to the seer is shown the judgment itself, with its condemning and its beatifying influence. That this does not happen now, [2174] but that first of all ch. 7 is still placed before the seventh seal, and that then, again, the last seal itself brings an entire series of visions, can interfere with the clear meaning of the sixth seal-vision the less, as the further development has the correct meaning just as it has been given. [2175]
[2172] , v. 17.
[2173] Mat 24:33 .
[2174] Although in fact from the seventh seal, the entire rest of the prophecy, even that of the final judgment corresponding to the fundamental plan of Rev 5:1 sqq., proceeds.
[2175] Cf. Introd., sec. 1, and on ch. Rev 7:8 .
. As Rev 11:13 , Rev 16:18 , Rev 8:5 . [2176] Earthquake; [2177] not indefinitely, “trembling,” [2178] for it is not at all said that by this the heavens shall be shaken.
. Cf. Isa 50:3 .
. Cf. Joe 3:4 .
. . Hesych: , . [2179] Cf. Son 2:13 . Winer, Rwb. , B. I., 429.
. Cf. Isa 34:4 . The idea that the firmament itself, from which the stars fall, [2180] gradually vanishes, [2181] is illustrated by the rolling-together of a book, since the heaven, the firmament, appears stretched out like tent-canvas. [2182]
, . . . As in Rev 16:20 , a quaking is indicated, overthrowing the foundations of the earth, and therefore final: no mountain, no island, remains on its old place. The destruction is complete.
Also, thereby, that terror now seizes (Rev 6:15 ) all, without exception, who have to fear the judgment; and by the way in which they make known their amazement (Rev 6:16 sqq.), especially by the express words on , . . ., it is clearly indicated that the subject from Rev 6:12 is the opening of the final judgment.
, . . . The , in the sense of Rev 6:10 , is here, as in Rev 19:18 , so introduced, that they appear not only collectively, [2183] but that the significant classification, at the same time, proves how no kind of earthly greatness or power, the previous cause of insolent assurance, can afford any protection whatever. [2184] Kings share the anguish with the humblest slaves. [2185] In addition to . . , the proper rulers, [2186] , are first mentioned. The expression, belonging to the later Greek, [2187] presents here [2188] high civil officers, especially courtiers, [2189] in distinction from chief commanders ( ). In addition to the , distinguished by wealth, are the , [2190] not “the mighty of every kind,” [2191] but [2192] such as excel in physical strength [2193]
. Those alarmed, even unto despair, seek in the mountains and rocks not so much ineffectual protection, [2194] as rather, as their own words show, [2195] death through which to escape the impending judgment of wrath. [2196]
., . . . The style is of such kind as to bear without doubt in Rev 6:16 , as well as in Rev 6:17 , traces of John’s own peculiar feeling. The [2197] is biblical; the . . . and the . . refer back to ch. Rev 4:5 ; the expression . . . . . depends upon Joe 3:4 ; Joe 1:15 ; Joe 2:2 , Isa 63:4 , etc.; and the question . , on Nah 1:6 , Mal 3:2 . [2198] Yet the entire discourse, even though Rev 6:17 be not regarded the words of John, has its truth in the mouth of unbelievers, since, just as they must recognize the Lord himself when he will appear, [2199] so also will they discern in the terrible signs (Rev 6:12 sqq.) the commencement of the day of judgment.
[2176] Cf. Isa 13:13 .
[2177] Hengstenb.
[2178] De Wette.
[2179] , the fig not ripened.
[2180] Cf. Gen 1:14 sqq.
[2181] Departs: . Vulg.: recessit . Incorrectly, Ew. ii.: “was rent in a place.”
[2182] Isa 40:22 ; Psa 104:2 .
[2183] Cf. Mat 25:32 : .
[2184] Klief. understands from erroneous pre-suppositions (see on Rev 1:20 ) “no blind heathen, but the masses of baptized nations who have fallen into Laodicean feelings.”
[2185] Cf. also Bengel, Hengstenb., Ebrard.
[2186] Cf. Act 4:26 .
[2187] Rev 18:23 ; Mar 6:21 ; cf. LXX. Jer 14:3 ; Neh 3:10 ; Isa 34:12 ; Dan 5:1 .
[2188] Cf. Mar 6:51 ; Dan 5:1 .
[2189] Ebrard, etc.
[2190] Var.: .
[2191] Ebrard; “prevailing in influence,” Ewald.
[2192] Cf. Rev 19:18 , Rev 5:2 , Rev 10:1 , Rev 18:8 ; Rev 18:21 , also Rev 18:2 ; Rev 18:10 , Rev 19:6 .
[2193] Cf. Psa 33:16 sqq., Psa 147:10 ; Ew. ii.; warriors, according to Jos 10:2 ; 1Ki 11:28 .
[2194] Cf. Isa 2:10 sqq.
[2195] Rev 6:16 ; cf. Hos 10:8 ; Luk 23:30 .
[2196] Cf. Hengstenb., Ebrard.
[2197] Beng.: “The face against them that do evil,” Psa 34:17 .
[2198] Cf. Ewald, etc.
[2199] Cf. Rev 1:7 .
(12) And I beheld when he had opened the sixth seal, and, lo, there was a great earthquake; and the sun became black as sackcloth of hair, and the moon became as blood; (13) And the stars of heaven fell unto the earth, even as a fig tree casteth her untimely figs, when she is shaken of a mighty wind. (14) And the heaven departed as a scroll when it is rolled together; and every mountain and island were moved out of their places. (15) And the kings of the earth, and the great men, and the rich men, and the chief captains, and the mighty men, and every bondman, and every free man, hid themselves in the dens and in the rocks of the mountains; (16) And said to the mountains and rocks, Fall on us, and hide us from the face of him that sitteth on the throne, and from the wrath of the Lamb: (17) For the great day of his wrath is come; and who shall be able to stand?
Some have thought, that what is here said under the sixth seal, hath respect to the final judgment at the great day of God. And to be sure, the awful things which are here related seem, in the first view of the subject, to favor that opinion. But when it be considered, that there is another seal yet remaining to be opened, independently also of what hath not yet been brought forward, of the Trumpets and Vials, it must at once strike the mind with conviction, that however strong in allusion to the last day, the things here represented may be, it is impossible.
I do not presume upon this, or any other scripture, of doubtful signification, to speak in the least decidedly, but I venture to observe, that as it strikes me, the whole events here represented, in this strong figurative language, was only intended to point out the awful judgments which should take place, under the ministration of the sixth seal. According to the general calculation, as to the time of this sixth seal, there had only run out about three hundred years, when it was opened. And the Empire now becoming Christian, (that is in the profession of it.) the persecutions which then began against the true Church, though now arising from heresies instead of heathenism without, became more dreadful, if possible, than the former. It was somewhat about this period, that arose that heretic Arius, denying the Godhead of Christ; whose baleful influence hath showed its malignity in every period, from that time to the present. I venture therefore to believe, that what is here said under the several similitudes of an earthquake, the sun becoming black, and the moon as blood, and stars from heaven falling and the like, are intended to set forth the awful event, in a Christ-despising doctrine, such as in the present day, the world professing Christianity is remarkable for. And what figures more suited to speak the monstrous baseness and ingratitude in the foul dishonor shown to the Lord Jesus Christ, than, that at the view of which, the sun turns black, and the moon becomes red with blood? And the eventual consequences to the actors of this perfidious treatment of Christ, is as finely represented, in that their discovery when too late, of the glory of the Lord Jesus; and as set forth under all the alarms of their guilty souls, in calling to the mountains and the rocks to fall on them, to hide them, if possible, from the wrath of the Lamb? According to my view of this scripture, there appears a striking propriety in the whole, and nothing can be more suited to each other, than the guilt and the punishment. But having said thus much, I leave it with the Reader to make his own conclusion, under God’s teaching.
12 And I beheld when he had opened the sixth seal, and, lo, there was a great earthquake; and the sun became black as sackcloth of hair, and the moon became as blood;
Ver. 12. There was a great earthquake ] Understand hereby those horrible commotions and confusions that occured in the Roman empire upon those ten bloody persecutions, and the earnest supplications of the saints which can work wonders in heaven and earth. The death and destruction of the persecutors was (as it was said of the death of Arius) precationis opus non morbi, the effect of faithful prayers calling for full and final vengeance. (Socrates i. 15.)
The sun became black ] It is ordinary in Scripture to set forth horrible commotions of commonwealths by such figurative expressions as these, Jer 4:23-31 Joe 2:10-11 Isa 13:10 .
12 7:17 .] OPENING OF THE SIXTH SEAL, AND ITS ATTENDANT VISIONS. And herein ( Rev 6:12-17 ) Immediate approach of the great day of the Lord , Mat 24:29 [98] : ( Rev 7:1-8 ) gathering of the elect out of the four winds , Mat 24:31 ; ( Rev 7:9-17 ) vision of the whole glorified church , Mat 25 .
[98] When, in the Gospels, and in the Evangelic statement, 1Co 11:23-25 , the sign () occurs in a reference, it is signified that the word occurs in the parallel place in the other Gospels, which will always be found indicated at the head of the note on the paragraph. When the sign () is qualified , thus, ‘ Mk.,’ or ‘ Mt. Mk.,’ &c., it is signified that the word occurs in the parallel place in that Gospel or Gospels, but not in the other or others .
The interpretation of this sixth seal is a crucial point in Apocalyptic exegesis. We may unhesitatingly set down all interpretations as wrong, which view as the fulfilment of this passage any period except that of the coming of the Lord. See the grounds of this below. And I saw when he opened the sixth seal, and a great earthquake took place (we have no word but “ earthquake ” for , but it does not by any means cover the meaning. For here the heavens are shaken (against Dsterd.), and the sea, and the dry land. See Hag 2:6-7 , and the comment in Heb 12:26 f. Compare also Zec 14:4-5 ), and the sun became black as sackcloth of hair (see ref. Isa. The cloth meant is the cilicium: see note on Act 18:3 . This answers to Mat 24:29 , ., and to , in Joe 2:31 ), and the whole moon (i. e. not the moon in her crescent or her incomplete form, but entire; as we say, the full moon) became as blood (so Matt. l. c., ; and Joe 2:31 , , ), and the stars of the heaven fell to the earth (so Matt. l. c., ), as a fig-tree casteth her unripe figs ( , , Hesych. De W. explains it to mean, the winter figs, which almost always fall off unripe) when shaken by a great wind (so Matt. again, l. c., . It is remarkable, that in Matt., when the description has finished, the next words are . The similitude from the fig-tree, though a different one, rises to the mind of the Apostle as he sees in vision the fulfilment of his Master’s words which were so shortly followed by a similar illustration. The imagery itself, as that in the beginning of the next verse, is from Isa 34:4 ). And the heaven parted asunder as a scroll when rolled up (the stars having fallen from it, the firmament itself was removed away, as an open scroll which is rolled up and put by. So also almost verbatim, Isa 34:4 ), and every mountain and island were moved out of their places (cf. again Mat 24:35 , : the whole earth is broken up by a change as total as any of those previous ones which have prepared it for its present inhabitants. Cf. ch. Rev 16:20 ; and Nah 1:5 , , ). And the kings of the earth and the great men (the word belongs to later Greek. It serves here to designate the great civil officers, statesmen and courtiers, as distinguished from the next following) and the chief captains (see reff., especially those in Acts, where the officer in command of the garrison at Jerusalem is so called) and the rich men and the strong men (hitherto the enumeration has comprised all those who from their circumstances would have most ground for trust in the permanence of the existing state of the earth: these last, the , being perhaps the physically strong, cf. Ps. 32:16: or perhaps all those who on account of any , physical or intellectual, are of the number of the sturdy or stout-hearted. The word is commonly used by the LXX as an epithet or even as a name ( ) of Jehovah: but also as here: see reff. Now, the catalogue becomes more general) and every man, bond and free, hid themselves in ( , pregn.; ran for shelter into ) the caves and in the rocks of the mountains (see reff. Isa., from which the imagery comes), and say to the mountains and to the rooks, Fall upon us and hide us from the countenance (see ref., and cf. Psa 33:16 , ) of Him that sitteth upon the throne, and from the wrath of the Lamb (the imagery is from Hos 10:8 , further impressed by our Lord’s solemn saying on the way to Calvary, Luk 23:30 : the meaning, that all these shall seek death or annihilation in terror of the coming day, when they shall have to stand before God): because the great day (we have no way in English of expressing the without an awkward periphrasis. The art. lifts the adjective out of its mere epithetal office, and makes it almost a title the day, that great day: cf. Act 8:10 , where the people say of Simon Magus, . This name, . , if properly considered, should have kept expositors firm here to the great verity of this part of the Apocalyptic visions, and prevented them from going in omnia alia as they have done) of His wrath is come (the virtually perfect sense of the aor. here can hardly be questioned. Yet even here an account may be given of the aoristic use: see note on ch. Rev 11:15 ), and who is able to stand (reff., and Mal 3:2 )? We are thus brought to the very threshold itself of the great day of the Lord’s coming. It has not yet happened: but the tribes of the earth are troubled at its immediate approach, and those terrible signs with which all Scripture ushers it in, have taken place. We are now then arrived at the time described in Mat 24:30 ; the coming itself of the Son of man being for a while kept in the background, as hereafter to be resumed. He is seen as it were coming: but before the vengeance is fully accomplished, the elect of God then living on the earth must be gathered, as Mat 24:31 , out of the four winds of heaven, from among the inhabitants of the earth. To this ingathering the sealing in our text is the necessary preliminary. The correspondence between the series of prophecies holds even in the minutest particulars, and where they do not correspond, their very differences are full of instruction. See these pointed out as we proceed.
Rev 6:12-17 . The sixth seal opened ( cf. Crashaw’s To the Name of Jesus , 220 234).
Rev 6:12-14 . The earthquake (reff.), darkening of sun by atmospheric disturbances, (Verg. Georg . i. 463 f., Lucan i. 75 f. 522 f., Compare Ass. Mos. Rev 10:4 f.: et tremebit terra. Usque ad fines suas concutietur sol non dab it lumen et in tenebras conuertet se, etc.; for Babylonian background cf. Schrader, 3 392 f.), reddening of the full moon as in a total eclipse ( cf. reff.), the dropping of stars, the removal of the sky, and the displacement of mountain and island (En. i. 6, see below on Rev 14:20 ) are all more or less stereotyped features of the physical situation in apocalyptic eschatology, where naturally ( cf. Jos. Bell . iv. 4, 5) agonies and distortions of the universe precede some divine punishment of men (Verg. Georg . i. 365 f.).
NASB (UPDATED) TEXT: Rev 6:12-17
12I looked when He broke the sixth seal, and there was a great earthquake; and the sun became black as sackcloth made of hair, and the whole moon became like blood; 13and the stars of the sky fell to the earth, as a fig tree casts its unripe figs when shaken by a great wind. 14The sky was split apart like a scroll when it is rolled up, and every mountain and island were moved out of their places. 15Then the kings of the earth and the great men and the commanders and the rich and the strong and every slave and free man hid themselves in the caves and among the rocks of the mountains; 16and they said to the mountains and to the rocks, “Fall on us and hide us from the presence of Him who sits on the throne, and from the wrath of the Lamb; 17for the great day of their wrath has come, and who is able to stand?”
Rev 6:12 “He broke the sixth seal” This verse is Jewish apocalyptic language for the end of the age (cf. Joe 2:30-31; Joe 3:15-16; Isa 13:9-10; Isa 34:4; Jer 4:23-28; Hag 2:6; Mat 24:29; and The Assumption of Moses, Rev 10:5). Notice the seven items in Rev 6:12-14. This language is used in the OT for the Lord’s Day. Its use here in the sixth seal and later in the sixth trumpet is the one reason, I believe, that each of these series of sevens terminates with the end of the age, the Second Coming of Christ (cf. Rev 6:12-17; Rev 11:15-18; Rev 14:14-20; Rev 16:17-21; Rev 19:11-21; Rev 22:6-16). Revelation is not chronologically sequential. It is a drama of seven acts.
“there was a great earthquake” There are many earthquakes mentioned in this book (cf. Rev 8:5; Rev 11:13; Rev 11:19; Rev 16:18). It is interesting to note that there are seven aspects to this end-time, apocalyptic event. There are also seven different categories listed in Rev 6:15 (see Special Topic: Symbolic Number in Scripture at Rev 1:4). This is another example of the highly structured, literary pattern of apocalyptic literature (cf. Rev 5:12).
“the sun became black. . .moon became like blood” This is an OT allusion to judgment day (cf. Isa 13:10; Isa 24:23; Isa 50:3; Eze 32:7; Joe 2:2; Joe 2:10; Joe 2:31; Joe 3:15; Mat 24:29; Mar 13:24-25; Luk 21:25).
Rev 6:13 “stars of the sky fell” This metaphor may have two origins:
1. the stability of God’s created order (cf. Job 38:31-33; Psa 89:36-37; Isa 13:10; Jer 31:35-36; Jer 37:20-21; Enoch 2:1) dissolves amidst God’s judgments (cf. Mat 24:29)
2. stars falling is a common intertestamental apocalyptic metaphor (which usually refers to angels, i.e., Rev 12:4; Dan 8:10)
In this context #1 fits best.
Rev 6:14 “the sky was split apart” The ancients viewed the sky as a solid dome of stretched skin (cf. Job 22:14; Psa 104:2; Pro 8:27; Isa 40:22). This is a metaphor of deity breaking into the natural order (cf. Isa 34:4).
“every mountain and island were moved out of their places” In the OT, whenever God visited His creation, either for blessing or judgment, it convulsed. The description is often painted in apocalyptic terms. Revelation 15-17 describe God’s wrath on the unbelieving persecutors (cf. Rev 16:20). These same descriptions are used in the OT to make physical access to God’s presence easier, like the lowering of mountains, the drying up of rivers, etc. (cf. Isa 40:4).
Rev 6:15 “hid themselves in the caves and among the rocks of the mountains” As God’s persecuted people had to hide from the persecutions of unbelievers (cf. Heb 11:38), so now the rich and powerful (possible allusion to Psa 2:2) seek shelter from God’s wrath (cf. Isa 2:10; Isa 2:19; Isa 2:21). This verse describes fallen, unbelieving mankind in seven ways. This use of sevens is a basic pattern in John’s book (see Special Topic at Rev 1:4).
Rev 6:16 “fall on us and hide us from the presence of Him who sits on the throne” This is an allusion to Hos 10:8 (cf. Isa 2:19; Isa 2:21 and Luk 23:30). Notice that the Father’s and the Son’s wrath are linked as they deplore what is happening to their family of faith. They act in history to vindicate the faithful and punish the rebellious (cf. Gal 6:7).
“wrath of the Lamb” This is a powerful mixed metaphor. This imagery of a victorious lamb is from Jewish interbiblical literature. For “wrath” (org) see note at Rev 7:14.
Rev 6:17 Rev 6:17 seems to be an allusion either to Joe 2:11 or Mal 3:2. Many commentators believe that Rev 6:17 sets the stage for the interlude found in chapter 7, which attempts to answer the question, “What about the believers who are on the earth during these apocalyptic events and series of judgments?” There has always been a debate among commentators as to whether the seals in chapter 6 are redemptive or judicial (cf. Rev 9:20-21; Rev 14:7-8; Rev 16:9; Rev 16:11). Chapter 6 refers to God’s judgment on unbelievers who refuse to believe. These judgments start out effecting 1/4 of the world, then 1/3 and finally in the bowls the entire unbelieving world (cf. Zep 1:14-18).
CONTEXTUAL INSIGHTS TO Rev 7:1-17
A. Chapter 7 forms an interlude between the sixth seal and the opening of the seventh seal (cf. Rev 8:1, as does Rev 10:1 to Rev 11:13 between the sixth and seventh trumpets). It deals with the question of what is happening to believers during these cycles of God’s judgment on unbelievers. The seventh seal becomes the seven trumpets.
B. This interlude deals with two groups of believers
1. The 144,000 from the Twelve Tribes on earth (cf. Rev 7:1-8, esp. Rev 7:4)
2. The innumerable host from the tribes of the whole earth who are now in heaven (cf. Rev 7:9-17, esp. Rev 7:9)
C. God acts in powerful, protective, assuring ways on behalf of His people. There is no distinction in Revelation between believing Jews and Gentiles (cf. Rom 2:28-29; Rom 3:22; 1Co 12:13; Gal 3:28; Col 3:11). The OT’s racial distinctions have been universalized into believers and unbelievers.
sixth seal. The signs immediately preceding the Advent of Rev 19.
Mat 24:4-5 (1st. The False Messiah), Rev 6:1-2
Mat 24:6-7 (2nd. Wars.) Rev 6:3-4
Mat 24:7 (3rd. Famines.) Rev 6:5-6
Mat 24:7 (4th. Pestilences.) Rev 6:7-8)
Mat 24:8-28 (5th Martyrdoms.) Rev 6:9-11
Mat 24:29-30 (6th. Signs in heaven of Advent.) Rev 6:12-17.
lo. Omit.
was = came to be.
earthquake. Greek. seismos. See Hag 2:6, Hag 2:7, Hag 2:21, Hag 2:22. Zec 14:5. Mat 8:24. Heb 12:26. Compare Psa 46.
moon. The texts add “whole”, i.e. the full moon.
as blood. i.e. as to color.
12-7:17.] OPENING OF THE SIXTH SEAL, AND ITS ATTENDANT VISIONS. And herein (Rev 6:12-17) Immediate approach of the great day of the Lord, Mat 24:29 [98]: (Rev 7:1-8) gathering of the elect out of the four winds, Mat 24:31; (Rev 7:9-17) vision of the whole glorified church, Matthew 25.
[98] When, in the Gospels, and in the Evangelic statement, 1Co 11:23-25, the sign () occurs in a reference, it is signified that the word occurs in the parallel place in the other Gospels, which will always be found indicated at the head of the note on the paragraph. When the sign () is qualified, thus, Mk., or Mt. Mk., &c., it is signified that the word occurs in the parallel place in that Gospel or Gospels, but not in the other or others.
The interpretation of this sixth seal is a crucial point in Apocalyptic exegesis. We may unhesitatingly set down all interpretations as wrong, which view as the fulfilment of this passage any period except that of the coming of the Lord. See the grounds of this below. And I saw when he opened the sixth seal, and a great earthquake took place (we have no word but earthquake for , but it does not by any means cover the meaning. For here the heavens are shaken (against Dsterd.), and the sea, and the dry land. See Hag 2:6-7, and the comment in Heb 12:26 f. Compare also Zec 14:4-5), and the sun became black as sackcloth of hair (see ref. Isa. The cloth meant is the cilicium: see note on Act 18:3. This answers to Mat 24:29,- ., and to , in Joe 2:31), and the whole moon (i. e. not the moon in her crescent or her incomplete form, but entire; as we say, the full moon) became as blood (so Matt. l. c., ; and Joe 2:31, , ), and the stars of the heaven fell to the earth (so Matt. l. c., ), as a fig-tree casteth her unripe figs (, , Hesych. De W. explains it to mean, the winter figs, which almost always fall off unripe) when shaken by a great wind (so Matt. again, l. c., . It is remarkable, that in Matt., when the description has finished, the next words are . The similitude from the fig-tree, though a different one, rises to the mind of the Apostle as he sees in vision the fulfilment of his Masters words which were so shortly followed by a similar illustration. The imagery itself, as that in the beginning of the next verse, is from Isa 34:4). And the heaven parted asunder as a scroll when rolled up (the stars having fallen from it, the firmament itself was removed away, as an open scroll which is rolled up and put by. So also almost verbatim, Isa 34:4), and every mountain and island were moved out of their places (cf. again Mat 24:35, : the whole earth is broken up by a change as total as any of those previous ones which have prepared it for its present inhabitants. Cf. ch. Rev 16:20; and Nah 1:5, , ). And the kings of the earth and the great men (the word belongs to later Greek. It serves here to designate the great civil officers, statesmen and courtiers, as distinguished from the next following) and the chief captains (see reff., especially those in Acts, where the officer in command of the garrison at Jerusalem is so called) and the rich men and the strong men (hitherto the enumeration has comprised all those who from their circumstances would have most ground for trust in the permanence of the existing state of the earth: these last, the , being perhaps the physically strong, cf. Ps. 32:16: or perhaps all those who on account of any , physical or intellectual, are of the number of the sturdy or stout-hearted. The word is commonly used by the LXX as an epithet or even as a name ( ) of Jehovah: but also as here: see reff. Now, the catalogue becomes more general) and every man, bond and free, hid themselves in (, pregn.; ran for shelter into) the caves and in the rocks of the mountains (see reff. Isa., from which the imagery comes), and say to the mountains and to the rooks, Fall upon us and hide us from the countenance (see ref., and cf. Psa 33:16, ) of Him that sitteth upon the throne, and from the wrath of the Lamb (the imagery is from Hos 10:8, further impressed by our Lords solemn saying on the way to Calvary, Luk 23:30 :-the meaning, that all these shall seek death or annihilation in terror of the coming day, when they shall have to stand before God): because the great day (we have no way in English of expressing the without an awkward periphrasis. The art. lifts the adjective out of its mere epithetal office, and makes it almost a title-the day, that great day: cf. Act 8:10, where the people say of Simon Magus, . This name, . , if properly considered, should have kept expositors firm here to the great verity of this part of the Apocalyptic visions, and prevented them from going in omnia alia as they have done) of His wrath is come (the virtually perfect sense of the aor. here can hardly be questioned. Yet even here an account may be given of the aoristic use: see note on ch. Rev 11:15), and who is able to stand (reff., and Mal 3:2)? We are thus brought to the very threshold itself of the great day of the Lords coming. It has not yet happened: but the tribes of the earth are troubled at its immediate approach, and those terrible signs with which all Scripture ushers it in, have taken place. We are now then arrived at the time described in Mat 24:30; the coming itself of the Son of man being for a while kept in the background, as hereafter to be resumed. He is seen as it were coming: but before the vengeance is fully accomplished, the elect of God then living on the earth must be gathered, as Mat 24:31, out of the four winds of heaven, from among the inhabitants of the earth. To this ingathering the sealing in our text is the necessary preliminary. The correspondence between the series of prophecies holds even in the minutest particulars, and where they do not correspond, their very differences are full of instruction. See these pointed out as we proceed.
Rev 6:12-16. And I beheld when he had opened the sixth seal, and, lo, there was a great earthquake, and the sun became black as sackcloth of hair, and the moon became as blood, and the stars of heaven fell unto the earth, even as fig tree casteth her untimely figs, when she is shaken of a mighty wind. And the heaven departed as a scroll when it is rolled together; and every mountain and island were moved out of their places. And the kings of the earth, and the great men and the rich men, and the chief captains, and the mighty men, and every bondman, and every free man, hid themselves in the dens and in the rocks of the mountains and said to the mountains and rocks, Fall on us, and hide us from the face of him that sitteth on the throne, and from the wrath of the Lamb:
Think of the contrast between this awful cry and the sentence we read just now: Then did they spit in his face. Mountains and rocks, fall on us, and hide us from the face of him that sitteth on the throne. Think, too, of the contrast of which we were reminded in our opening hymn,
While sinners in despair shall call,
Rocks hide us; mountains, on us fall!
The saints, ascending from the tomb,
Shall joyful sing, The Lord is come!
Rev 6:17. For the great day of his wrath is come; and who shall be able to stand?
Let us read further on in the same Book. (See Rev 19:11-16)
This exposition consisted of readings from Mat 26:57-68. Rev 6:12-17, Rev 19:11-16, Rev 20:11-15, Rev 21:1.
Rev 6:12. , the sixth) See notes at Rev 6:9. D. Lange, Comm. Apoc., f. 11, says, that it is proved by the agreement of almost all interpreters, that the events of the sixth seal are future. But almost all interpreters, with the exception of those who refer it to the very consummation of the world, interpret it of the past; as even the Apocalyptic Parallels of Sentiments by Jungnitius teach, p. 138, and following. As far as relates to the subject, he has not proved that this seal refers to those things which are about to take place before the end of the world, and have not however as yet taken place: and yet on this theory he has built up the whole mass of his superstructure, fol. foll. Wherefore this ought to have been demonstrated as firmly as possible. We lately vindicated the passage from Matthew 24, to which there is a parallel in Luke 21- – ,[79] the sun-the moon) They are here taken in their literal sense. There is a description of the alarm occasioned to the dead by that condition of the universe which there shall be at the last day: an alarm occasioned at the time when the Apocalypse was written: which even at that early time truly said, it is coming. [It is plain that these things cannot be referred to the destruction of the world itself; for there follows at length (not until after the sixth) the seventh seal, containing many things, and those of importance: nor to any other judgment, to be put into execution against enemies; of whom, in fact, the mention is made afterwards. In like manner, under the fifth seal, it was revealed to the souls under the altar, out of favour to them, what was being done on their account. The beginning is made from the earth; as ch. Rev 20:11.-V. g.][80]
[79] The epithet, , is considered of less importance in the margin of Ed. maj. than in Ed. 2 and Vers. Germ.-E. B.
[80] Ver. 15. , hid themselves) Where was now the spirit of those whom the world had so greatly feared?-V. g.
Rev 6:12-17
2. THE SIXTH SEAL OPENED
Rev 6:12-17
12 And I saw when he opened the sixth seal, and there was a great earthquake; –When this seal was opened John saw in the picture in heaven the appearance of a great commotion in which the material elements of the universe seemed to he rocking and falling from their natural places. He also saw the effect that such commotion had on the people of the earth. All this, it must be remembered, was in the symbolic vision, and should not be confused with what it represented. An earthquake naturally would represent some great disturbance, the nature of which must be learned by a careful study of scripture texts.
and the sun became black as sackcloth of hair, and the whole moon became as blood; 13 and the stars of the heaven fell unto the earth, as a fig tree casteth her unripe figs when she is shaken of a great wind.–The only excuse for taking this language literally is the view of some expositors that the seal refers to the coming of the Lord and the end of the world. But this position will not do, for it is followed by a period in which a multitude of the redeemed will be sealed, and the opening of the seventh seal under which the seven trumpets are to be sounded. Since in all the preceding seals the language is mainly symbolical, the presumption is that it is so in this seal. A figurative use of the words sun, moon, and stars is clearly evident in such texts as the following: Joe 2:10; lsa. 13:9, 10; Jer 4:24.
14 And the heaven was removed as a scroll when it is rolled up; and every mountain and island were moved out of their places.–This too is what John saw in the picture, and therefore is to be applied figuratively just as the words sun, moon, and stars. Rolled up “as a scroll” is unquestionably symbolic language and indicates the removal of the heaven. Though John saw what appeared as the literal heaven rolled up, that must represent the removal of something else. A great earthquake refers to some terrible agitation. Sun, moon, and stars refer to prominent persons. (Gen 37:9.) The prophet referred to Jesus as the “sun of righteousness.” (Mal 4:2.) The sun becoming black, the moon like blood, and the stars falling mean that prominent persons through commotions and bloodshed would lose their places and cease to function in their usual manner. Such fall would be comparable to the untimely dropping of unripe figs when the tree is violently shaken. Mountains refer to governments. The kingdom of Christ was prophetically described as the “mountain of Jehovah’s house.” (Isa 2:2.) Mountains and islands being moved out of their places must, therefore, refer to radical changes in forms of governments. No small changes would be represented by such a breaking up of the material universe.
15 And the kings of the earth, and the princes, and the chief captains, and the rich, and the strong, and every bondman and freeman, hid themselves in the caves and in the rocks of the mountains; –John is still describing the picture in heaven. This is another scene that passed before his eyes, which evidently was intended to show the effect that such a commotion would have on men. A literal darkening of the sun, moon turning red, the heavens disappearing and mountains moving would so agitate all classes of men that they would cry for help and seek places of shelter if possible. This would be the natural effect of such material disturbances on the mind of men. It symbolically represents the consternation and commotions that political and national upheavals would have upon the people in the affected kingdoms. Since the picture shows how the mind will be ffected by any calamitous disturbance, material or spiritual, the language itself here does not say which it is. In nature the consternation would be the same regardless of what produced it; the cry for escape from serious consequences would also be the same. The language shows that all classes–high and low –would be equally distressed. The classes mentioned are representative; it means that the disturbance would be so great that none would escape from the terror. As a radical change in government would disturb them, they would be trying to avoid persecution and death. This is further brought out in the next verse.
16 and they say to the mountains, and to the rocks, Fall on us, and hide us from the face of him that sitteth on the throne, and from the wrath of the Lamb: 17 for the great day of their wrath is come; and who is able to stand?–This is the language of terror on the part of those in danger of some impending calamity. The particular thing feared must be determined by the general teaching of the text or context. Hos 10:8 has the same thought when Israel was threatened with punishment. Substantially the same language is used by Jesus in Luk 23:30, referring to the destruction of Jerusalem. It is simply a poetical way of expressing the cry of distress. When the calamity came, they would consider it a day of wrath coming from God and Christ. Or, they would acknowledge that their being overcome was because God’s permission or power was with their enemies. Their conclusion would be that, if divine favor was against them, no one would be able to stand. This is true regardless of when or what particular wrath of God may be in view here.
Since the seventh seal, under which there are seven trumpets, must intervene between this seal and the end of time, the language of this text cannot refer to Christ’s coming and the end of the world. It must, therefore, mean some special day (period) of wrath. If the fifth seal found its striking fulfillment in the persecution in the reign of Diocletian, the position here taken, then we would expect the sixth to be fulfilled later when some great change would take place in the Roman Empire–such changes as would affect both the empire and the church. The well-known relationship of the church to pagan Rome during those centuries is ample proof of this view. We insist that no exposition of Revelation can be correct which ignores the vital influence each had on the other, as the plain facts of history show. The fact that those who cried for the rocks to fall upon them wanted to be hid from the face of God shows them to be sinners, not God’s people. The great changes indicated by the commotion in the material universe must have occurred among the church’s enemies within the Roman Empire. In such a governmental change all false religions, particularly the national form of them, would suffer defeat; rulers and those in authority would lose their powers, and general weeping among them would be common.
The changes that transpired in the reign of Constantine, who was emperor from A.D. 307 to 337, will harmonize with the things pictured in this seal. In 308 the empire was divided among six emperors. By A.D. 313 they were reduced to two–Constantine and Licinius. The latter, who was a champion of Paganism, was defeated in A.D. 323 and Constantine became the sole emperor of the Roman world. Since Constantine was favorable to Christianity, the struggle was really a war between Christianity and Paganism. The defeat of the latter caused great mourning and distress among the enemies of Christianity. In the Edict of Milan, A.D. 313, privilege was granted for each man to worship as he saw fit, and none were to be prevented from practicing or embracing Christianity. In A.D. 321 he decreed that Sunday, the day the Christians observed as a day of worship, should be a day of rest in towns from business and labor. This was a concession to Christianity. In A.D. 325 he convened the first general counsel of the church over which he presided. In A.D. 326 he began the building of Constantinople to which he removed the capital of the Roman Empire. (Encyc. Brit., 14th ed., pp. 297-9.) He is supposed to have entered the church himself before he died. Gibbon refers to him as the patron of the church who “seated Christianity on the throne of the Roman world.” (Decline and Fall, Vol. II, p. 273.) He also says “War and commerce had spread the knowledge of the gospel beyond the confines of the Roman provinces; and the barbarians, who had disdained an humble and proscribed sect, soon learned to esteem a religion which had been so lately embraced by the greatest monarch, and the most civilized nation, of the globe.” (Ibid., p. 275.) Surely all this was a political and spiritual earthquake that shook pagan nations to their foundations, and brought mourning to their rulers, but honor and glory to the church. Whatever might be said in favor of other times, certainly none could more fittingly fulfill the scenes depicted in this seal.
Unless the correct application of the sixth seal is understood, the remainder of the book will be in hopeless confusion; there will be no place for the sealing of the saints mentioned in the seventh chapter and the seventh seal, under which the seven trumpets are to sound. The last trumpet brings the end of time. (11:15-18; 1Co 15:52.) The man of sin, Babylon, and the scarlet-robed woman–emblems of the apostate church–are all to be destroyed when the Lord comes. (2Th 2:8; Rev 19:19-21; Rev 18:21-24.) The sixth seal mentions nothing about this great event. The changes in the material universe at the end of time will be literal. (2Pe 3:10.) All the scriptural facts demand that the changes indicated by the sixth seal are to be understood as symbols and applied to the events mentioned in the preceding notes.
The prophet Isaiah used the following language concerning the destruction of ancient Babylon: “For the stars of heaven and the constellations thereof shall not give their light; the sun shall be darkened in its going forth, and the moon shall not cause its light to shine. . . . Therefore I will make the heavens to tremble, and the earth shall be shaken out of its place, in the wrath of Jehovah of hosts, and in the day of his fierce anger.” (Isa 13:10-13.) Clearly this is symbolic language, and plain proof that the emblems of the sixth seal may be applied to the overthrow of the pagan Roman Empire rather than to changes in the material elements mentioned.
Commentary on Rev 6:12-17 by Foy E. Wallace
The shaking of the nations (sixth seal)-Rev 6:12-17.
The judgments depicted in this seal indicate a response to the plea of the souls under the altar in the fifth seal. The representations, symbols and language are so similar to the descriptions of Mat 24:29-31 as to be identical in their significance. It describes the coming of the Son of man after the tribulation mentioned in the verses before it, as the sixth seal of Rev 6:1-17 joins with the contents of the fifth seal before it. The divine visitations in the signs of terrestrial upheavals and celestial disturbances form an identical imagery. The comparison is impressive, if not conclusive evidence of their fulfillment in the same series of events.
1. There was a great earthquake-Rev 6:12.
In all of these scenes the earth is the place of the nations. The earthquake is the symbol of revolution, the shaking up of the nations in their various places. It is the figure of the agitations, upheavals, resulting in the revolutions and wars of Mat 24:29. It is the symbol of divine judgment on the nations persecuting the cause of the Lamb. The same signal of the earthquake is found in the Old Testament prophecies of Isa 29:6, in the former judgments on Judah and Jerusalem. It has the same adaptations and similar applications, in Mat 24:6-7, describing the wars in the tributaries of Rome and all over Palestine, Galilee, Samaria, 177 A.D. 66, preceding the destruction of Jerusalem.
2. The sun black, the moon blood-Rev 6:12.
These exact metaphors were employed by the prophet Isaiah to signify the darkness that was then to settle over the Babylonian people in the destruction of their city, Babylon. (Isa 13:10) The same figures of speech were adapted by Jesus to describe the end of the Jewish state which resulted from the destruction of Jerusalem, and of their theocracy in the demolition of the temple. (Mat 24:27-29) The figurative description is appropriated in the sixth seal of Revelation as a preview of the divine visitations on the persecuting powers.
3. The stars of heaven fell unto the earth-Rev 6:13.
The downfall of Jewish authorities, rulers, and officials of government is here symbolized. The same signs are used in Isa 13:10 in the prophetic description of the fall of the Babylonian rulers. The princes and nobles of the Babylonian kingdom were called stars in Dan 8:10, and were said to be cast down; and in Dan 12:3 Gods people were said to shine as stars forever.
4. As a fig tree casting untimely figs when shaken by mighty wind-Rev 6:13.
The fig tree was the most familiar fruit bearing tree of scripture illustrations. The first pair clothed their nakedness with fig leaves. (Gen 3:7) The universal benefits of the new covenant were envisioned by Malachi as every man under his vine and under his fig tree. (Mic 4:4) The desolation of Nineveh is compared by Nahum to the ripe fig falling from the tree that is shaken. (Nah 3:12) The dissolution of the enemies of Gods people is described by Isaiah to the leaf falling from the vine and to a falling fig from a tree. (Isa 34:4) The rejection of the Jews was insinuated by Jesus in the cursing of the fruitless fig tree. (Mat 21:19)
So the maledictions about to fall upon the persecutors of the Lambs followers all symbolized by the casting, or forcible falling, of figs from the tree when she is shaken of a mighty wind”–the wind of divine wrath. Isaiah compares the withholding of divine judgments against Ephraim as the staying of his rough wind (Isa 27:4); and Jeremiah prophesied that a full wind would come upon Jerusalem, not to fan, not to cleanse, but as a judgment to execute sentence against them. (Jer 4:11-12) So this apocalyptic seal makes the casting of the fig from the tree, when shaken of a mighty wind, a portent of the destruction that was reserved for the persecutors of the Lambs people.
5. The heaven departed as a scroll when it is rolled-Rev 6:14.
The word heavenhere refers to the seats of government, the powers of dominion. The persecuting powers would depart, fold up, as a scroll, and roll back. Using the same figure in describing the fall of Babylon, Isaiah said the host of heaven shall be dissolved and the heavens shall be rolled together as a scroll. (Isa 34:4)
The disintegration of the enemies of the church was also foretold in the Messianic prophecies of Isaiah by the use of the same figures as John employed in the imagery of Revelation; and it is again comparable to the Lords pronouncement concerning the events after the fall of Jerusalem, that with a great sound of a trumpet, he would send his messengers to gather his elect from the four winds, from one end of heaven to the other–(Mat 24:31) -a description of expansion of the gospel after the destruction of Jerusalem and the downfall of Judaism. And in verse 34 the Lord said with the emphasis of Verily I say unto you that this generation shall not pass until all these things be fulfilled. Here is the blanket proof that these events belonged to that time, that they pertained to the church and the nations of the persecution period and not to a distant future of far and remote centuries.
6. Every mountain and island were moved out of their places-Rev 6:14.
This is another symbolic expression to designate the divine visitations on the persecuting powers. Figuratively the mountains denoted places of authority in a kingdom (Amo 4:1) , and the powerful concentration of enemies (Isa 41:15). The island denotes the inhabitants of the sea, from over the sea, or any land bordering the sea; and the prophets referred to the Gentile peoples as the isles of the Gentiles and isles of the sea.
In the imagery of this sixth seal mountains and islands –both Jewish and Gentile persecuting authorities, Palestinian and Romans–would be overthrown, moved out of their places, their power dissipated. Pronouncing judgment on Tyrus for oppressing Jerusalem, Ezekiel said the isles would shake and tremble at her fall and all the isles of the sea shall be troubled at thy departure. (Eze 26:15-18) So of these Jewish and Gentile authorities after the tribulation of those days. Jesus said the powers of the heavens shall be shaken. (Mat 24:29)
7. And the kings of the earth, and the great men . . . said to the mountains and rocks, Fall on us, and hide us from the face of him that sitteth on the throne. . . . For the great day of his wrath is come; and who shall be able to stand?”-Rev 6:15-16.
This is a quotation from Hosea describing the men of high places–kings, nobles, warriors, captains and conquerors– all of whom were to be humbled with men of low station, calling to the mountains for cover. In pronouncing doom on Jerusalem Jesus quoted Hos 10:8, as recorded by Luke: Daughters of Jerusalem weep not for me but weep for your children. For behold the days are coming . . . they shall begin to say to the mountains Fall on us; and to the hills cover us.”–(Luk 23:28-30)
Since the quotation in Rev 6:16 and Luk 23:30 are from the same prophecy of Hos 10:8, it is the Lords own application of its fulfillment in those events surrounding the destruction of Jerusalem, and it is therefore solid evidence which cannot be controverted that the seals of Revelation are not now future.
8. For the great day of his wrath is come and who shall be able to stand-Rev 6:17.
As the previous verse is a direct quotation from Hosea, this last verse of the sixth seal is an allusion, if not a quotation, of Nah 1:5-6 : The mountains quake at him, the earth burned at his presence . . . who can stand before his indignation? Who can abide his fierce anger? His fury is poured out . . . the rocks are thrown down by him.
The Revelation passages are connected by quotation and the meaning is evident. The appeal of the great and mighty was for covert from the face of Him that sat on the throne and from the Lamb who was in the midst of the throne, which means that both God and Christ joined in the events of visitation in this pageant of retributive judgment on the nations. It places the passage where it belongs, not to the final judgment nor to a future procession of events, but to the period of the struggle and triumph of the early church with and over the Jewish and Roman persecutors of the apostolic and post-apostolic period.
Commentary on Rev 6:12-17 by Walter Scott
THE SIXTH SEAL.
COMPLETE SUBVERSION OF ALL
GOVERNMENTAL AND CIVIL AUTHORITY.
Rev 6:12-17. – And I saw when He opened the sixth Seal, and there was a great earthquake; and the sun became black as hair sackcloth, and the whole moon became as blood, and the stars of Heaven fell upon the earth as a fig tree, shaken by a great wind, casts its unseasonable figs. And the Heaven was removed as a book rolled up, and all mountains and islands were removed out of their places. And the kings of the earth, and the great, and the chiliarches, and the rich, and the strong, and every bondman and freeman hid themselves in the caves and in the rocks of the mountains; and they say to the mountains and to the rocks, Fall on us, and have us hidden from (the) face of Him that sits upon the throne, and from the wrath of the Lamb; because the great day of His wrath is come, and who is able to stand? Under the former Seal we witnessed a fierce struggle between light and darkness. The conflict between good and evil knows no cessation. But God shall triumph in the end. The full answer to the appeal of the martyred saints must await the completion of the martyred band. A second outburst of rage against Gods witnesses, directed by the Beast and his satellite, the Antichrist, is there intimated. Then will come the hour of awful tribulation. Then will an angry God deal in judgment with the cruel persecutors of His people. It is a righteous thing with God to recompense tribulation to them that trouble you (2Th 1:6). But under this Seal God begins to deal judicially with the world, thus giving an earnest of the full answer yet to be vouchsafed to the cry underneath the altar.
The scene here described is an awful and sublime one. The symbols employed are the powers of nature. The whole fabric of civil and governmental power on earth breaks up. Disorder reigns supreme. It is not simply the collapse of this or that government, but the total subversion of all governing authority, both supreme and dependent. The general idea which the metaphors present is a universal overthrow of all existing authority; a revolutionary crisis of such magnitude that kings and slaves are in abject terror. The coming crash will involve in one general catastrophe everything on earth deemed secure and strong. A vast civil, social, and political chaos will be created. What an awful scene to contemplate! A world without a magistrate! Without even the semblance of rightful power! Without government! Without the authority of repression!
Rev 6:12. – A great earthquake denotes a violent disruption of the organised state of things, a complete subversion of all existing authority. Under the seventh Seal, and preparatory to the infliction of yet severer chastisements (Rev 8:5), an earthquake, along with other signs, is mentioned as a public intimation of coming wrath. But here the earthquake is termed great, as its effects upon men amply testify. Under the seventh Vial (Rev 16:18) there will be another social and political revolution exceeding in its effect what we have in our text, a catastrophe of such an appalling character that history affords no parallel to it. It must be borne in mind that the Seals unfold a series of consecutive and preliminary sorrows. The great earthquake does not usher in the day of the Lord. There are two groups of signs mentioned by the Lord in His great prophetic discourse (Mat 24:1-51; Mat 25:1-46). The first group applies to the period before the great tribulation (Mat 24:6-14), the second group has its application after the tribulation, and announces the immediate Return of the Lord in power (v. 29). Now the events under the Seals are prior to the tribulation, and really coalesce with the earlier state of things described in Mat 24:6-14. The great earthquake of our text does not, therefore, announce the final judgment, nor is it the immediate precursor of the Lords return, whatever men may say in their fear and terror (Rev 6:17). The very fact that a yet more awful earthquake succeeds the one of our text should settle the question (Rev 16:18). The state of things described under the sixth Seal is to be followed by more awful horrors.
Rev 6:12. – The sun became black as hair sackcloth.(Hair sackcloth was originally made of camels hair (Mat 3:4), and was the Prophets usual garment (Zec 13:4). But it was pre-eminently the mourning garb (Rev 11:3; 2Sa 3:31. etc.). It is in this latter sense in which it must be viewed here.) The sun symbolizes the supreme governing authority (Gen 37:9; Rev 12:1). Black as hair sackcloth denotes the darkening power of Satan, and points to the supreme authority of earth (on which all were dependent) in a condition of utter collapse (Isa 50:3; Eze 7:18). The darkening of the heavenly bodies is an awful calamity in the physical world, and hence the aptness of the figure here.
Rev 6:12. – The whole moon became as blood. All authority immediately derived from and dependent on the supreme power is here figured by the whole (Whole, omitted in the Authorized, but inserted in the Revised, as also by Tregelles, Kelly, Darby: is found in the Sinaitic, Alexandrian, and Vatican Codices.) moon. The moon in the material realm is a secondary planet, and symbolizes derivative authority in the moral realm. It is the chosen figure of Israel as dependent upon Christ the Sun of Righteousness (Son 6:10; Psa 81:3). Became as blood. The moral death and apostasy of every subordinate authority is intimated. Blood is a universal figure of death (Rev 11:6; Rev 19:2; Rev 19:13).
Rev 6:13. – The stars of Heaven fell upon the earth as a fig tree, shaken by a great wind, casts its unseasonable figs. All lesser authorities, as individual rulers, civil and ecclesiastical, morally fell from their exalted station. God and their relation to Him were morally given up. The unripe or unseasonable figs are those concealed under the leaves which never ripen, and which are cast off in winter by a strong wind. When the wintry winds of Gods wrath sweep across the scene, then those who were never truly His, however exalted their position, shall openly apostatize and abandon all external relation to Him (Isa 34:4).
Rev 6:14. – The Heaven was removed as a book rolled up. The political, civil, and ecclesiastical systems, the constitution, bonds, and frame work of society, shall as completely disappear as a book or scroll is unreadable when rolled up. The physical removal of the heaven (Rev 21:1) and of the heavens (2Pe 3:10), not, of course, the dwelling place of God, of saints, and of angels, is one of the most stupendous events which the Word of God records. But the entire cessation of all governmental order, the moral Heaven, is one of those coming events most awful to contemplate. We have had the ruin of all greater and lesser authorities, but here the whole system in which they were placed itself collapses.
Rev 6:14. – All mountains and islands were removed out of their places. A system of settled power is represented by a mountain (Dan 2:35; Jer 51:25), a long established, stable, and powerful government. Islands were regarded by the Jews as sources of wealth, as centres of trade and commerce (Isa 23:2; Eze 27:3-15). The removal of all, regarded as enduring and great, as also the sources of wealth and commerce, are here declared.
UNIVERSAL TERROR.
The effect of this mighty and universal revolution in civil and political life will be a scene of awful terror. In keeping with a marked characteristic of the Apocalypse, in which the numeral seven is largely employed, there are enumerated seven classes of men, and, as usual, these again are divided into two groups of three and four. The first consists of those who govern: kings, the highest and most exalted; great, or princes, see Revised Version; and chiliarches, or military tribunes. (In Mar 6:21 we read of Herod making a supper to his nobles and the chiliarches or military officers, and the chief men of Galilee, but these latter would not necessarily be officials; they were probably eminent persons in a private station.) The second group includes the non-official class presented in pairs: the rich and strong, – bondman and freeman. (In Rev 13:16; Rev 19:18 the order is reversed as the free and bond.)
Rev 6:15. – All, high and low, rich and poor, hid themselves in the caves and in the rocks of the mountains. What a vivid emblem of terror! The fear of the Lord and the glory of His majesty in governmental power, as witnessed in the universal disruption of society, will strike men with such awful dread that the caves and rocks of the mountains (This second and further reference to the mountains would in itself show that the physical heaven, moon, stars, mountains, etc., are not actually contemplated, but are to be understood symbolically. How could every mountain be removed (Rev 6:14) and yet be sought for subsequently as a hiding place (Rev 6:15)? There will be physical changes in the heavens and earth at the commencement (Zec 14:1-21) and close of the millennial reign (2Pe 3:1-18), but the time under which this Seal has its place would forbid anything but a moral and symbolical signification.) shall be eagerly sought as hiding places from His wrath and to screen them from His face. It is an hour of mortal fear. In their terror they appeal not to God, but to the mountains and rocks to fall upon them and hide them from the face of Him that sits upon the throne, and from the wrath of the Lamb. Their guilty fears add, Because the great day of His wrath is come, and who is able to stand? It is not so. Heavier judgments are looming, darker clouds are gathering ere the final hour of concentrated agony known as the wrath of the Lamb transpires. Under the sixth Seal the first droppings of the coming storm of divine wrath cause universal terror and fear. When the storm actually bursts at the personal return of the Lord, then, instead of dread of His wrath, bold, high-handed contempt of the Lamb will characterize the scene (Rev 19:17-19) which the warrior king will drench in blood.
We have to be exceedingly careful not to allow the consideration of details to weaken in our souls the general effect of this thrilling description of coming events, and the consequent fears of men. Even a cursory reader must feel awed at the almost unparalleled magnificence and sublimity of the scene about to be enacted, which is revealed in terms so full and plain that their bearing cannot, save by the wilfully ignorant, be misunderstood. The consideration of the seventh Seal (We had thought of presenting a condensed summary of the historical application of the Seals, but on further reflection decided not to do so. We are amazed at the conflict of opinion by the historicalists. Scarcely two are agreed in their interpretations, while their assigned dates to this and that event are in hopeless confusion. Little wonder that the mass of Christians regard the study of the Apocalypse with an amount of suspicion difficult to get rid of. The principle of interpretation is clearly erroneous. If the Revelation is to be interpreted by the light which the facts of history record, it necessarily shuts out by far the greater number of Gods people from the study of the book, for how can they study history? Besides, if those who have done so and seek to interpret the book on this principle differ so widely that scarcely two are agreed, how hopeless the task for others. We are satisfied that the principle on which this book is sought to be interpreted by the historical school is utterly false. Gods Spirit alone is the power by which prophecy is to be understood, and not the facts of history. The Revelation from chapter 4 refers to the future.) must be reserved till we enter upon the study of chapter 8.
Commentary on Rev 6:12-17 by E.M. Zerr
Rev 6:12. Following the opening of the fifth sealJohn saw some of the results of persecution, and it had been brought against Christians by Pagan (heathen) Rome. But there came a change in the general conditions. The emperor Constantine professed to be converted to Christianity, and it caused him to make many reverses in the activities of men in high places. The statements through the rest of this chapter are worded as if John saw the works of creation undergo radical changes. Such is to be expected in a book written with symbols. Hence the earthquake and darkening of the heavenly lights are tokens of the disturbances in the government.
Rev 6:13. Stars of heaven refer to men in high places who lost much of their power by the changes that Constantine was making. Untimely figs means fruit that is not ripe, yet it was shaken loose by the revolution going on in the government.
Rev 6:14. The heaven refers to the region that covers the earth, used here as a symbol of the great domain in which important men ruled with selfish interests. The disappearance of this reign of selfishness is likened to a scroll that is rolled up and laid away. Mountains and isles in symbolic language means seats of government, and these began to be altered by the revolutionary work of Constantine.
Rev 6:15. The various great persons named in this verse are the men in high position who had been holding uninterrupted sway over their people. As they began to see the fading of their domination it filled them with terror. Such an attitude is symbolized by an attempt to find hiding places in dens and among the rocks.
Rev 6:16. In their state of fear they would prefer being put out of the conflict, even if the mountains would tumble down upon them. Hide us . . . from the face of the Lamb. These men who had held sway for so long were made to realize that the change was brought about by the influence of the religion their emperor had espoused.
Rev 6:17 : Great day of his wrath does not refer to the last great day of judgment, for the book is not that far along in the world drama. It is the day in which these overbearing men in high places in the pagan government of Rome, came to realize the effects that the religion of Christ was bringing as a punishment upon them.
Commentary on Rev 6:12-17 by Burton Coffman
Rev 6:12
And I saw when he opened the sixth seal, and there was a great earthquake; and the sun became black as sackcloth of hair, and the whole moon became as blood;
This and the following five verses are a prophetic description of the Second Advent and the judgment of the great day. There is no way that the total imagery of these amazing verses can be accommodated to any other view.
Smith said, “The events here must be placed at the end of this age.”[45] “It is the day of the Lord’s summing up of all things.”[46] “The fullest application of this belongs to the final advent.”[47] It is our sincere conviction that those expositors, of many illustrious names, who fancy that these verses are a prophecy of “the decay of society,”[48] or “sudden revolutions that would fill the world with alarm,”[49] are mistaken. These words simply cannot be so explained. It is true, of course, that Joel’s very similar language was declared by Peter to have been fulfilled by the momentous events of Pentecost, but there are most essential differences in the prophecy here from those found in the Old Testament.
The cosmic earthquake in view here should be understood in the light of Heb 12:28, under which see fuller comment on “the end of the world,” in my Commentary on Hebrews, pp. 335ff. “The whole universe will be shaken to pieces, and the only things to survive will be those that are unshakable.”[50] Hendriksen was sure that, “This describes the judgment day, the one great catastrophe at the end of the age.”[51]
[45] Wilbur M. Smith, Wycliffe Bible Commentary, New Testament (Chicago: Moody Press, 1971), p. 1068.
[46] Douglas Ezell, Revelations on Revelation (Waco: Word Books, 1977), p. 43.
[47] W. Boyd Carpenter, Ellicott’s Bible Commentary, Vol. VIII (Grand Rapids, Michigan: Zondervan Publishing House, 1959), p. 562.
[48] Charles H. Roberson, op. cit., p. 45.
[49] Albert Barnes, op: cit., p. 136.
[50] F. F. Bruce, The Epistle to the Hebrews (Grand Rapids, Michigan: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1967), p. 383.
[51] William Hendriksen, op. cit., p. 129.
Rev 6:13
and the stars of the heaven fell unto the earth, as a fig tree casteth her unripe figs when she is shaken of a great wind. And the heaven was removed as a scroll when it is rolled up; and every mountain and island were moved out of their places.
“Here we have one picture of the end; all of the language is figurative.”[52] All discussion of whether these passages are to be understood figuratively or literally are beside the point. “That day will spell the end of the entire universe as we know it.”[53] “The atomic age has opened our eyes to the fact that such extreme language may be fulfilled with horrible literalness.”[54]
[52] R. C. H. Lenski, op. cit., p. 239.
[53] Michael Wilcock, op. cit., p. 74.
[54] Ralph Earle, op. cit., p. 546.
Rev 6:15
And the kings of the earth, and the princes, and the chief captains, and the rich, and the strong, and every bondman and freeman, hid themselves in the caves and in the rocks of the mountains; and they say to the mountains and to the rocks, Fall on us, and hide us from the face of him that sitteth on the throne, and from the wrath of the Lamb: for the great day of their wrath is come; and who is able to stand?
It is the presence of the Lamb in this scene that separates it from all similar prophecy in the Old Testament. Furthermore, the total assembly of all citizens of earth does the same thing. Read Mat 24:29-30 in connection with this; and it is starkly clear that the same Great Day is in both prophecies. That a visible coming of Christ is taught here is certain, because the unbelieving populations would never acknowledge the existence of the Lamb of God on the Throne on the basis of any other evidence than his appearance in glory.
Like many others, Caird rejects the idea of the actual end of the world being depicted here on the basis that, “The inhabitants of the earth would hardly still be hiding and calling to the mountains to fall on them.”[55] Despite this objection, Christ himself represented the great judgment (Matthew 25) as a time when there would actually be dialogue between the King and both the saved and the lost, and all of this upon the very occasion of their being assigned their eternal destiny. A similar thing is in view here. Therefore, far from being an objection to interpreting this as the final Great Day, the cries of earth’s inhabitants is a proof of that very thing, because it identifies the occasion with that of Matthew 25.
The thing that is actually in the way of many interpreters accepting this as the final judgment day was stated thus by Love, “One would have difficulty with later scenes in Revelation,”[56] in which the world still stands. Therefore, it is the understanding of Revelation as some kind of in-sequence story of the earth that prevents many from understanding this reference to the judgment. When all the “judgment references” are understood as successive references to the “same day,” the difficulty disappears.
Kings … captains … princes … rich … strong … Six classes of mankind are mentioned, but they stand for all people. “Under the symbolism of these six classes, John sees the entire godless world seized with sudden fear.”[57] Fear of what? They do not fear death, because death is what they are praying for. It is the Lamb of God whose sudden appearance in glory has signaled the close of earth’s probation. Instantaneously, there’s not an infidel anywhere in the universe anymore. It is this colossal scene that requires our understanding of it as the Second Advent and judgment. Just how the accompanying language of stars falling, mountains moving, sun being darkened, etc., must be interpreted, we do not pretend to know; but one thing is sure:
God will bring his purpose to pass, and he will do so though it means that this world order, and indeed this whole mighty universe, pass away.[58]
The essential reality underlying all the symbolism of these verses is simply, “The terror which John foresaw when God would invade the earth when time was coming to an end.”[59] “The swift agony of being crushed to death is preferable to being left face to face with the indignation of an outraged God.”[60]
Of all the incredible postulations advanced by scholars regarding the meaning of this passage, that of Caird wins the prize. He wrote:
There is no need to find a place in John’s theology for any concept of the wrath of the Lamb! It is not a phrase which he (John) uses, but one on the lips of the terrified inhabitants of earth![61]
Caird went on to insist that the wicked of earth are such that a lie has become their second nature. Therefore, this must be a lie which they speak on the occasion envisioned here. Our view is that the wrath of the Lamb is central to the theology of both the Old Testament and the New Testament, and of all apostles of Jesus Christ. As for the inhabitants of earth shouting another lie at the Second Advent, who could believe such a thought? It will be the supreme moment of truth for all mankind; and the terrors of the occasion for the wicked will in no sense be merely psychological, nor the result of some “paranoiac delusion to which they have surrendered themselves.”[62]
The great day of their wrath … Any theology which fails to take into account the ultimate wrath of God against wickedness and injustice is a false theology. The so-called theology of our own times has reduced God to the status of an overindulgent grandfather image who is too lazy, too indifferent, or too full of love to punish anything or anybody, no matter what crimes of lust and blood may rage under his very nose. Subscribers to this brand of theology are to be identified absolutely with those who, in this great passage, suddenly behold the truth and cry for the rocks and mountains to hide them.
This glimpse of the Second Advent and final judgment is brief and fragmentary, as must needs be with all such glimpses; but the picture will be filled out in subsequent chapters of Revelation where are to be found other visions of the Great Day. These successive presentations of that ultimate day of wrath and glory actually provide the most logical and convenient divisions of this complicated prophecy.
The events of Revelation 7, about to be prophesied, are actually prior in the time sequence to this judgment scene. “It is isolated in form and content from its context.”[63] The whole of Revelation 7 may therefore be understood as a parenthetic interruption of the terrible judgment scene for the purpose of comforting the faithful. More about this apparent dislocation of Revelation 7 will be given in the notes on it; but we are including here Moffatt’s words on the design of it:
It is a consoling rhapsody or rapture designed to relieve the tension by lifting the eyes of the faithful over the foam and the rocks of the rapids on which they were tossing to the calm, sunlit pool of bliss. The parenthesis consists of two visions, one on earth, one in heaven.[64]
[55] G. B. Caird, op. cit., p. 92.
[56] Julian Price Love, Layman’s Bible Commentary, Revelation (Richmond, Virginia: John Knox Press, 1961), p. 69.
[57] William Hendriksen, op. cit., p. 131.
[58] Leon Morris, Tyndale Commentaries, Vol. 20, Revelation (Grand Rapids, Michigan: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1969), p. 112.
[59] William Barclay, op. cit., p. 15.
[60] James Moffatt, op. cit., p. 394.
[61] G. B. Caird, op. cit., p. 92.
[62] Ibid.
[63] James Moffatt, op. cit., p. 394.
[64] Ibid.
Commentary on Rev 6:12-17 by Manly Luscombe
12 I looked when He opened the sixth seal, and behold, there was a great earthquake; and the sun became black as sackcloth of hair, and the moon became like blood. 13 And the stars of heaven fell to the earth, as a fig tree drops its late figs when it is shaken by a mighty wind. 14 Then the sky receded as a scroll when it is rolled up, and every mountain and island was moved out of its place. 15 And the kings of the earth, the great men, the rich men, the commanders, the mighty men, every slave and every free man, hid themselves in the caves and in the rocks of the mountains, 16 and said to the mountains and rocks, Fall on us and hide us from the face of Him who sits on the throne and from the wrath of the Lamb! 17 For the great day of His wrath has come, and who is able to stand? Great earthquake – The 6th seal is a picture of the end of time. The earth will be destroyed. The description is of the Second Coming. All the world and physical things will end. Similar language is used in the Old Testament (Joe 2:10; Isa 13:5-11). The sun becomes black. The moon becomes as blood. The stars of heaven fall to the earth. The sky is parted and rolled up like a scroll. Every mountain and island are moved (earthquake). Seven classes of men – kings, great, rich, chief captains, mighty, bondman, and freeman. They try to hide from the wrath of God and they beg for death to escape facing God. The final payday has come and no evil person can survive.
Sermon on Rev 6:9-17
The Seven Seals
Brent Kercheville
The first four seals have been opened and what has been revealed is sweeping judgment. Four different colored horses have been unleashed to conquer, wage war, bring famine, and kill with sword, pestilence, famine, and wile beasts. We noted in our last lesson that these seals have parallel to the imagery Jesus reveals in Matthew 24 concerning the destruction of Jerusalem. We also noticed in our last lesson that these four tools of death (sword, famine, pestilence, and wild beasts) were the tools promised by God to use against Israel if they were disobedient. With these thoughts in our minds, let us continue to read as the seals continue to open.
The Fifth Seal (Rev 6:9-11)
The Lamb opens the fifth seal and we have a change of imagery. The four horsemen have been unleashed to conquer, to make war, to send famine, and bring death. Our attention is turned to the souls who have been slain because of the word of God and for their witness. The souls of Christians who died under persecution for Christ are seen under the altar. The altar depicts their sacrificial suffering because of their faith and their witness. This is a sad scene. A picture of the people of God who have been killed for the word of God and for their testimony. Their physical bodies were killed but their souls are seen under the altar crying out in a loud voice. They are crying out these words, O Sovereign Lord, holy and true, how long before you will judge and avenge our blood on those who dwell on the earth? They are crying out for justice. This is an appeal to Gods justice. It is a cry that is similar to the words of the prophet Habakkuk. Look at the wickedness that is going on throughout the earth. How long, Lord, until you judge and bring justice?
The answer given is rather interesting and somewhat depressing. The slain people of God are pictured as being given a white robe. The white robe is a picture of purity and faithfulness. The greater image is that these souls are victorious. The white robe represents they are victorious because of their purity and faithfulness. At a Roman triumph the conquering general would wear a white robe (Osborne, 288). These saints are conquerors because they have been faithful (see the end of each letter to the seven churches of Asia).
The answer continues that these martyred souls were to rest for a little longer. Judgment was not going to happen immediately. They must rest a little long until the number of their fellow servants and their brothers should be complete, who were to be killed as they themselves had been. There are more who are going to be slain for Christ before these judgments unfold. The answer seems to be that God is not stopping the death of his people right now. More are going to die for the word of God and the testimony of Jesus before judgment is unleashed on the earth. Before we leave this point we must remember that the scriptures tell us that the persecutor of Christians in the first century is the Jews. The book of Acts reveals that Stephen is killed by the Jewish authorities. Paul is persecuted, stoned, and left for dead by the Jews. The Jews chase Paul and his companions from city to city stirring up the crowds against them. It is the Jews that raid Jasons house in Thessalonica. Too often we focus on the Roman persecution of Christians and forget that the Jews are also persecutors of the people of God. To wrap this point, go back to the seven churches of Asia and notice who are persecuting the Christians. It is those who say they are Jews but are not. They are a synagogue of Satan. This is stated to the church in Smyrna and the church of Philadelphia. The Jewish people are claiming to be Gods people, but Christ says they are not.
The Sixth Seal (Rev 6:12-17)
The sixth seal is opened and devastating things happen. There is a great earthquake. The sun became black as sackcloth, the full moon became like blood and the stars fell from the sky like a fig tree losing its fruit in a windstorm. The sky vanished like a scroll being rolled up and every mountain and island was removed from its place. The kings of the earth and all the great one, every single person hid themselves in the caves and among the rocks of the mountains. They were calling to the mountains and the rocks to fall on them and hide them from the face of the one seated on the throne and from the wrath of the Lamb. This sounds like the end of the world. This sounds like the final judgment and the second coming of Christ. However, we need to observe that this language isused repeatedly in the scriptures and it is not used to describe the end of the world. Consider the following passages that use similar language.
Behold, the day of the LORD comes, cruel, with wrath and fierce anger, to make the land a desolation and to destroy its sinners from it. 10 For the stars of the heavens and their constellations will not give their light; the sun will be dark at its rising, and the moon will not shed its light. 11 I will punish the world for its evil, and the wicked for their iniquity; I will put an end to the pomp of the arrogant, and lay low the pompous pride of the ruthless. 12 I will make people more rare than fine gold, and mankind than the gold of Ophir. 13 Therefore I will make the heavens tremble, and the earth will be shaken out of its place, at the wrath of the LORD of hosts in the day of his fierce anger. (Isa 13:9-13 ESV)
Was Isaiah prophesying about the end of the world? No, we need to read the beginning of this prophecy which is found in Isa 13:1. The oracle concerning Babylon which Isaiah the son of Amoz saw. (Isa 13:1 ESV) Isaiah is speaking about the fall of the nation of Babylon. He using graphic imagery to describe that the fall of Babylon will not be partial or slight. It will be a complete judgment and utter destruction. We learn that when we read this language of the sun becoming black, the moon turning to blood, and the stars falling from the sky, we are reading about God saying that this nation will no longer exist. It will be judged so that it will not see the sun. Its power has fallen like stars falling from the sky. All they will see is blood.
Ezekiel used the same imagery.
I will drench the land even to the mountains with your flowing blood, and the ravines will be full of you. 7 When I blot you out, I will cover the heavens and make their stars dark; I will cover the sun with a cloud, and the moon shall not give its light. 8 All the bright lights of heaven will I make dark over you, and put darkness on your land, declares the Lord GOD. (Eze 32:6-8 ESV)
Once again this sounds like the end of the world. But the prophecy is not about the end of the world, but about a national judgment against Egypt (Eze 32:2).
This imagery is used again by the prophet Joel.
10 The earth quakes before them; the heavens tremble. The sun and the moon are darkened, and the stars withdraw their shining.
30 And I will show wonders in the heavens and on the earth, blood and fire and columns of smoke. 31 The sun shall be turned to darkness, and the moon to blood, before the great and awesome day of the LORD comes. (Joe 2:10; Joe 2:30-31 ESV)
Who was God prophesying this doom against? Look at Joe 2:32 and you will see that God is speaking against Jerusalem. God is not describing the end of the world.
Lets look at one more and this prophecy includes the image of the sky rolling up like a scroll.
Draw near, O nations, to hear, and give attention, O peoples! Let the earth hear, and all that fills it; the world, and all that comes from it. 2 For the LORD is enraged against all the nations, and furious against all their host; he has devoted them to destruction, has given them over for slaughter. 3 Their slain shall be cast out, and the stench of their corpses shall rise; the mountains shall flow with their blood. 4 All the host of heaven shall rot away, and the skies roll up like a scroll. All their host shall fall, as leaves fall from the vine, like leaves falling from the fig tree. 5 For my sword has drunk its fill in the heavens; behold, it descends for judgment upon Edom, upon the people I have devoted to destruction. (Isa 34:1-5 ESV)
Notice a few things about this prophecy. First, we must see that God is declaring judgment against Edom, not the end of the world. Second, please notice that God describes the earth as listening to this and watching this judgment. Verse 2 describes Gods anger against all the nations. The judgment of Edom was to be an example to the rest of the nations that they should turn back. The rest of the world was to learn the lesson from the destruction coming upon Edom. The great day of Gods wrath had come.
Therefore, when we read this same imagery used in Rev 6:12-17 we must not immediately assume that this prophecy refers to the end of the world. We will need to continue to read the book to determine what nation or people is the object of Gods wrath. Who is God judging? Whoever is being judged, Rev 6:15 contains a similar point as Isaiah 34. Everyone is supposed to learn by witnessing Gods wrath. The kings of the earth, the great ones, the rich, the generals, the powerful, everyone, even slave and free, were to see and cower in fear at the wrath of God. God judging one nation was to be an object lesson to the rest of the nations of the earth.
Rev 6:15-17
The imagery of hiding in the mountains and calling for rocks to fall on them are images used for Jerusalems judgment. As Isaiah prophesied the coming destruction of Jerusalem because of their sins, notice the language Isaiah used.
And people shall enter the caves of the rocks and the holes of the ground, from before the terror of the LORD, and from the splendor of his majesty, when he rises to terrify the earth. 20 In that day mankind will cast away their idols of silver and their idols of gold, which they made for themselves to worship, to the moles and to the bats, 21 to enter the caverns of the rocks and the clefts of the cliffs, from before the terror of the LORD, and from the splendor of his majesty, when he rises to terrify the earth. (Isa 2:19-21 ESV)
Please notice that even though Jerusalem is the object of Gods wrath, the earth is terrified by the event. All people are to observe and learn from the wrath of God falling upon Jerusalem. Hosea prophesied that the judgment against the northern nation of Israel would be great and used the same language.
Samarias king shall perish like a twig on the face of the waters. 8 The high places of Aven, the sin of Israel, shall be destroyed. Thorn and thistle shall grow up on their altars, and they shall say to the mountains, Cover us, and to the hills, Fall on us. (Hos 10:7-8 ESV)
Jesus also used this same language about the nation of Israel and the coming fall of Jerusalem.
And as they led him away, they seized one Simon of Cyrene, who was coming in from the country, and laid on him the cross, to carry it behind Jesus. 27 And there followed him a great multitude of the people and of women who were mourning and lamenting for him. 28 But turning to them Jesus said, Daughters of Jerusalem, do not weep for me, but weep for yourselves and for your children. 29 For behold, the days are coming when they will say, Blessed are the barren and the wombs that never bore and the breasts that never nursed! 30 Then they will begin to say to the mountains, Fall on us, and to the hills, Cover us. 31 For if they do these things when the wood is green, what will happen when it is dry? (Luk 23:26-31 ESV)
As Rev 6:17 concludes the sixth seal, the point is appropriate. The great day of Gods wrath has come and who can stand? This is the main point of the six seals. Gods wrath has come. No one is going to withstand what God is doing. Judgment upon a nation has arrived.
Conclusion
There is nothing special about this judgment. What I mean by this is that this is the judgment that every person and every nation deserves. The great day of Gods wrath will come against all people and we of all people deserve that wrath as much as another. No one can stand before the wrath of God. We should be running to the mountains and hiding in the rocks and calling for these things to fall on us. We need to hide from the face of the one who sits on the throne. It does not matter who you are. Rich and powerful or not, no one can stand before the Almighty God.
Rev 6:11 shows grace in action. Those who died for the word of God are pictured as receiving white robes. Those who will give their lives to Jesus are shown victorious. This image will be drawn more fully for us in chapter 7. It is enough for this moment to see Gods people in heaven given white robes of victory.
LESSON 12.
OPENING THE SEALED BOOK
Read Revelation 6
1. Whose voice did John hear at the opening of the first seal? Ans. Rev 6:1.
2. What did John see? Ans. Rev 6:2.
3. Describe the rider on the white horse. Ans. Rev 6:2.
4. Who spoke to John when the second seal was opened? Ans. Rev 6:3.
5. What emerged when this seal was opened? Ans. Rev 6:4.
6. What was given to the rider of the red horse? Ans. Rev 6:4.
7. Describe the horse and rider that appeared at the opening of the third seal. Ans. Rev 6:5-6.
8. What was said by the voice in the midst of the four living creatures? Ans. Rev 6:6.
9. Who spoke when the fourth seal was opened? Ans. Rev 6:7.
10. What was the color of this fourth horse? Ans. Rev 6:8.
11. What was the name of the rider and what followed with him? Ans. Rev 6:8.
12. What power was given unto them? Ans. Rev 6:8.
13. Describe the four “living creatures” that spoke to John at the opening of these first four seals. Ans. Rev 4:6-8.
14. What did John see when the fifth seal was opened? Ans. Rev 6:9.
15. What question did they ask? Ans. Rev 6:10.
16. What was given to each? Ans. Rev 6:11
17. What were they told to do, and for how long? Ans. Rev 6:11.
18. What happened to the sun, the moon and stars at the opening of the sixth seal? Ans. Rev 6:12-13.
19. How were the heaven and the earth affected? Ans. Rev 6:14.
20. Who hid themselves in caves and rocks? Ans. Rev 6:15.
21. Why did they want the mountains and the rocks to fall on them? Ans. Rev 6:16-17.
FOR CLASS DISCUSSION
I. Discuss the danger of applying a symbol which God has not interpreted. Has God revealed the meaning of the four horses, and the significance of their four colors?
E.M. Zerr
Questions on Revelation
Revelation Chapter Six
1. What did the Lamb then do?
2. Then what kind of noise did John hear?
3. Tell what he heard one beast say.
4. What did he then see?
5. Tell what the rider had.
6. What was given to him?
7. What was it he went forth doing?
8. At opening of second seal who spoke?
9. Repeat what he said.
10. What creature then went out?
11. Was it with a rider?
12. Tell what he was empowered to take away.
13. What would people do to each other?
14. Tell what was given to this rider.
15. What was heard at opening of third seal?
16. Tell what John beheld then.
17. What was the rider carrying?
18. From where was a voice heard speaking?
19. What values were announced?
20. Tell the precaution that was given.
21. What seal was opened next?
22. At this what did John hear?
23. What did he then behold?
24. Tell the name of its rider.
25. With what was he followed?
26. What was given to him?
27. Tell what he could do with this.
28. How much of the earth could be atiect?
29. What did John see under the altar?
30. Why not their bodies?
31. For what had they been slain?
32. At what seal did this appear?
33. What were they crying with?
34. For what were they crying?
35. On whom did they wish vengeance?
36. What were given to them?
37. They were told to do what?
38. For how long must they do so?
39. Which seal was opened next?
40. What happened then?
41. How were the sun and moon atiected?
42. What happened to the stars?
43. To what was this compared?
44. What happened to the heaven?
45. And to the mountains and islands?
46. Who hid themselves?
47. Where did they hide?
4B. For what did they call?
49. Why did they wish this?
50. What day were they fearing?
Revelation Chapter Six
Ralph Starling
The 1st seal was opened with noise like thunder,
And John was filled with great wonder.
One of the 4 beasts said to me “Come and see.”
One by one the seals were opened revealing pages and pages of history that could hardly be spoken.
The 1st seal revealed a white horse, a rider and a bow.
A conqueror to conquer John could quickly behold.
The 2nd seal was opened and John was told to come and see.
I saw a red horse, a rider, a sword he could harly believe.
The 3rd seal, another horse and it was black.
The rider had balances suggesting food would be slack.
The 4th seal, behold a pale horse,
Yes, death and hell, things would get worse.
The 5th seal revealed the face of martyrs
Slain for following God’s orders.
They were given white robes of honor and their words of encouragement.
“Yet a little season” and help would be sent.
The 6th seal announced a terrific event.
Kings, rich, bondsment would cry and lament.
For the great day of the Lamb is at hand,
And who shall be able to stand.
there: Rev 8:5, Rev 11:13, Rev 16:18, 1Ki 19:11-13, Isa 29:6, Amo 1:1, Zec 14:5, Mat 24:7, Mat 27:54, Mat 28:2
the sun: Isa 13:9, Isa 13:10, Isa 24:23, Isa 60:19, Isa 60:20, Eze 32:7, Eze 32:8, Joe 2:10, Joe 2:30, Joe 2:31, Joe 3:15, Amo 8:9, Hag 2:6, Hag 2:7, Hag 2:21, Hag 2:22, Mat 24:29, Mat 27:45, Mar 13:24, Mar 13:25, Mar 15:33, Luk 23:44, Luk 23:45, Act 2:19, Act 2:20
Reciprocal: Gen 1:14 – and let Jos 10:13 – So the sun Psa 9:3 – they shall Isa 2:19 – when he Isa 5:30 – if one look Isa 30:30 – the flame Isa 34:2 – the indignation Isa 42:15 – General Isa 50:3 – General Isa 51:6 – the heavens Jer 4:28 – the heavens Eze 38:20 – the fishes Luk 21:25 – signs Act 16:26 – suddenly Rev 8:1 – And Rev 16:8 – upon Rev 17:14 – the Lamb shall
Rev 6:12. Following the opening of the fifth seal John saw some of the results of persecution, and it had been brought against Christians by Pagan (heathen) Rome. But there came a change in the general conditions. The emperor Constantine professed to be converted to Christianity, and it caused him to make many reverses in the activities of men in high places. The statements through the rest of this chapter are worded as if John saw the works of creation undergo radical changes. Such is to be expected in a book written with symbols. Hence the earthquake and darkening of the heavenly lights are tokens of the disturbances in the government.
Comments by Foy E. Wallace
Verse 12.
The shaking of the nations (sixth seal)–Rev 6:12-17.
The judgments depicted in this seal indicate a response to the plea of the souls under the altar in the fifth seal. The representations, symbols and language are so similar to the descriptions of Mat 24:29-31 as to be identical in their significance. It describes the coming of the Son of man after the tribulation mentioned in the verses before it, as the sixth seal of Rev 6:1-17 joins with the contents of the fifth seal before it. The divine visitations in the signs of terrestrial upheavals and celestial disturbances form an identical imagery. The comparison is impressive, if not conclusive evidence of their fulfillment in the same series of events.
1. There was a great earthquake–Rev 6:12.
In all of these scenes the earth is the place of the nations. The earthquake is the symbol of revolution, the shaking up of the nations in their various places. It is the figure of the agitations, upheavals, resulting in the revolutions and wars of Mat 24:29. It is the symbol of divine judgment on the nations persecuting the cause of the Lamb. The same signal of the earthquake is found in the Old Testament prophecies of Isa 29:6, in the former judgments on Judah and Jerusalem. It has the same adaptations and similar applications, in Mat 24:6-7, describing the wars in the tributaries of Rome and all over Palestine, Galilee, Samaria, 177 A.D. 66, preceding the destruction of Jerusalem.
2. The sun black, the moon blood–Rev 6:12.
These exact metaphors were employed by the prophet Isaiah to signify the darkness that was then to settle over the Babylonian people in the destruction of their city, Babylon. (Isa 13:10) The same figures of speech were adapted by Jesus to describe the end of the Jewish state which resulted from the destruction of Jerusalem, and of their theocracy in the demolition of the temple. (Mat 24:27-29) The figurative description is appropriated in the sixth seal of Revelation as a preview of the divine visitations on the persecuting powers.
Rev 6:12 a. And I saw when he opened the sixth seal, and there was a great earthquake. The verb saw is again to be taken absolutely as in Rev 6:1-2; Rev 6:5; Rev 6:8. The things seen divide themselves naturally into four groups; and we need not add to what has been already said as to the meaning of this number. (1) A great earthquake, which must be understood in its usual sense as a shaking of the earth alone (chaps. Rev 6:5; Rev 11:13; Rev 11:19; Rev 16:18), and not as a general shaking including heaven as well as earth. The celestial phenomena immediately following are quite independent. The idea of the earthquake may be in part that of Mat 24:7, but it is especially that of Mat 24:29. The figure is frequently used in the Old Testament as a symbol of the judgments of God about to come upon a sinful world (Psa 60:3-5; Isa 13:13; Hag 2:6; Hag 2:22-23).
Rev 6:12 b, Rev 6:13-14 A. And the sun became black as sackcloth of hair, and the whole moon became as blood, and the stars of the heaven fell unto the earth, even as a fig tree casteth her unripe figs when she is shaken of a great wind, and the heaven withdrew as a book roll when it is rolled together. (2) We pass from earth to the heavens. The vision is still couched in the language of Mat 24:29, and that again rests upon the figures with which Old Testament prophecy had made the Jews familiar (Isa 13:10; Isa 1:3; Jer 4:23; Eze 32:7-8; Joe 2:31; Joe 3:15; Amo 8:9-10; Mic 3:6). The sun becomes black as sackcloth of hair, the coarse sackcloth made of the black hair of camels. His light is quenched; and, instead of shining with his splendour in the sky, he appears as a great black orb. It is obvious that here, as in innumerable parts of the Apocalypse, we are to content ourselves with the main idea of the writer, and not to demand prosaic verisimilitude.The whole moon next becomes as blood, the word whole denoting the moon at its full size, so that the spectacle may be the more terrible. The addition is not found in the Old Testament prophecies upon which the language before us rests. It is made by the Seer under the feeling that no ancient prophet had foreseen such sights of woe as he had been commissioned to reveal.The stars of the heaven next fall to the earth, like unripe figs when the fig tree is shaken by a great wind. Firmly as they appear to be set in heaven, they are yet as easily displaced as the unripe fig when a great wind blows. They fall in a moment.The heaven itself is touched last of all Like a book-roll, it is rolled together, and is no longer the glorious firmament that it has been.
Rev 6:14 b. And every mountain and island were moved out of their places. (3) In these words the third member of the description follows. It will be observed that we have in them much more than the mention of the earthquake in Rev 6:12. An earthquake shakes the earth, but when the shaking is over things return, no doubt with some exceptions, to their old positions. Here all things are moved out of their places; the confusion and overthrow are complete.
A threefold interpretation is given relating to this sixth seal, and the opening of it.
1. Some apply it altogether to the Jews, and that their destruction in Judea and at Jerusalem was so dismal, that it was represented to St. John as the darkening of the sun, and the moon looking like blood, and the stars falling, such calamities impending as if heaven and earth were dissolving: doubtless at and before the destruction of Jerusalem there was a confluence of such calamities, so dismal, and so dreadful, as can very difficultly be represented or described.
2. Others apply it to the overthrow of Paganism, and the destruction of the Heathen emperors; the fall of Paganism, by means of Constantines’s conversion to the Christian faith, was the most terrible judgment that ever fell upon the devil’s kingdom: and accordingly, by the earth’s quaking, the sun’s becoming black, the moon’s becoming blood, and the stars falling from heaven to earth, is to be understood the great changes that were made in the Roman empire, by overturning the whole Pagan state, and making Christianity the religion of the greatest part of the world; so that the sense of the foregoing expression is metaphorical, and signifies a great and general alteration of the face of affairs, as if the world was to be another thing.
But, 3. There are that interpret all this of the great and horrible confusion of the Christian world under Antichrist, when Christ the Sun of righteousness began to be obscured, that is, his doctrine concerning his offices and benefits darkened; the moon or church turned into blood; the stars or pastors fallen from heavenly offices; the scriptures, like the heavens rolled up, forbidden to be read; the mountains, kings and princes, in jeopardy; and the islands brought under Antichrist’s yoke and tyranny.
Lastly, Some apply all this to the last dissolution of the world, and the final judgment of the great day; according to what follows in the three next verses.
The language of this verse is very similar to prophetic descriptions of God’s judgment against Babylon and the opening of the doors to the kingdom, which also meant the bringing to a close the Jewish system. ( Isa 13:1 ; Isa 13:10-13 ; Joe 2:28-32 ; Act 2:16-21 ) Here is the prophetic language describing the Lord’s vengeance upon the persecutors.
Rev 6:12-17. And I beheld Further in my vision; when he The Lamb; had opened the sixth seal; and lo! there was a great earthquake Greek, , there was a great concussion: for the expression comprehends the shaking of heaven as well as of the earth; and the sun became black as sackcloth of hair It lost its usual lustre, and looked black and dark, as in a total eclipse; and the moon became as blood Instead of appearing with its usual brightness in the heavens, it appeared of a dusky-red colour, as blood. And the stars of heaven fell They seemed to disappear out of their places in the heavens, and to fall down upon the earth, like meteors, or as blasted fruit is blown down from the trees upon the ground in a violent storm. And the heaven departed as a scroll, &c. It was further represented to me in my vision as if the heavens were no longer spread over the earth, but rolled up together as a roll of parchment; and every mountain and every island The most secure from the danger of earthquakes, were not only shaken, but quite overturned and destroyed; so as never to be restored again: and all this, says Lowman, to signify, according to the expressions of ancient prophecy, such a downfall of the empire and power of heathen Rome, as should never be recovered; but the power of these idolatrous enemies of the Christian faith should cease and be no more, as the power of the Assyrians and Babylonians, the ancient enemies of Gods people, was destroyed and never recovered. Thus the Prophet Joel describing, in the beautiful images of prophetic style, a famine to be occasioned by a great number of locusts, which were to devour the whole fruits of the earth, so expresses it, Joe 2:10; The earth shall quake before them, the heavens shall tremble, the sun and moon shall be dark, and the stars shall withdraw their shining. The Prophet Isaiah, prophesying of a great destruction of Gods enemies, for their opposition to his church, (which he calls the day of the Lords vengeance, and the year of recompenses for the controversy of Zion, Isa 34:8,) thus describes it, Rev 6:4; And all the host of heaven shall be dissolved, and the heavens shall be rolled together as a scroll, and all their hosts shall fall down as the leaf falleth off from the vine, and as a falling fig from the fig-tree. The general meaning of which expressions is explained in the following verse; For my sword shall be bathed in heaven; behold it shall come down upon Idumea, and upon the people of my curse to judgment. In like manner, the same prophet thus expresses the judgments of God in the punishment of sinners, Isa 13:10; For the stars of heaven and the constellations thereof shall not give their light; the sun shall be darkened in his going forth, and the moon shall not cause her light to shine. The meaning of which is thus explained in the next words, Rev 6:11; I will punish the world for their evil, and the wicked for their iniquity; and I will cause the arrogancy of the proud to cease, and will lay low the haughtiness of the terrible. The Prophet Ezekiel uses the same images to express the downfall of oppressive empires and power. Thus in the prophecy of the destruction of the empire of Egypt by the empire of Babylon, Eze 32:7-8; And when I shall put thee out, I will cover the heaven, and make the stars thereof dark; I will cover the sun with a cloud, and the moon shall not give her light; all the bright lights of heaven will I make dark over thee, and set darkness upon thy land, saith the Lord God. And Jeremiah, concerning the land of Judah, Jer 4:23-24; I beheld the earth, and, lo! it was without form and void; and the heavens, and they had no light; I beheld the mountains, and, lo, they trembled; and all the hills moved lightly. And thus our Saviour himself also speaks, concerning the destruction of Jerusalem, Mat 24:29; The sun shall be darkened, and the moon shall not give her light, and the stars shall fall from heaven, and the powers of the heavens shall be shaken. Now it is certain, says Bishop Newton, who interprets this prophecy in the same manner, that the fall of any of those cities and kingdoms was not of greater concern and consequence to the world, nor more deserving to be described in such pompous figures, than the fall of the pagan Roman empire, when the great lights of the heathen world, the sun, moon, and stars, the powers civil and ecclesiastical, were all eclipsed and obscured, the heathen emperors and Cesars were slain, the heathen priests and augurs were extirpated, the heathen officers and magistrates were removed, the temples demolished, and their revenues appropriated to better uses. It is customary with the prophets, after they have described a thing in the most symbolical and figurative diction, to represent the same again in plainer language; and the same method is observed here, Rev 6:15-17 :
And the kings of the earth, and the great men, and the rich men, and the chief captains, and the mighty men, and every bond-man and every free- man; That is, Maximian, Galerius, Maximin, Maxentius, Licinius, &c., with all their adherents and followers, were so routed and dispersed, that they hid themselves in the dens, and in the rocks of the mountains, and said to the mountains and rocks, Fall on us and hide us Expressions used, as in other prophets, (Isa 2:19; Isa 2:21; Hos 10:8; Luk 23:30,) to denote the utmost terror and consternation; Fall on us, and hide us from the face of him that sitteth on the throne, and from the wrath of the Lamb, &c. This is therefore a triumph of Christ over his heathen enemies, and a triumph after a severe persecution; so that the time and all the circumstances, as well as the series and order of the prophecy, agree perfectly with this interpretation. Galerius, Maximin, and Licinius made even a public confession of their guilt, recalled their decrees and edicts against the Christians, and acknowledged the just judgments of God and of Christ in their destruction. The history of this extraordinary event is given more at large by Lowman, from whose account the following short extract is taken. A short time after the heavy persecution of Dioclesian, termed, in the prophecy, a little season, (Rev 6:11,) a very great change took place in the heathen Roman empire, attended with great calamities on the persecutors of the Christians, even such as broke in pieces their oppressive power. Dioclesian and Maximian had been compelled by Galerius to resign the empire and retire to private life; but upon the death of Constantius, and the accession of his son Constantine to his part of the empire, Maxentius having got himself declared emperor at Rome, Galerius, to suppress this rebellion, persuaded Maximian to resume the empire, which he did; but in a short time had the mortification of being deposed; and soon after, having in vain attempted to take the life of Constantine, put an end to his own life. Galerius was smitten with a very loathsome and incurable distemper, attended with such insupportable torments, that he often endeavoured to kill himself, and caused some of his physicians to be put to death because their medicines had not been effectual to remove his disorder. At last, his wicked and cruel conduct toward the Christians being brought to his remembrance, as the cause of his sufferings, he immediately put an end to the persecution (that had been carried on against them) by a public edict, in which he particularly desired their prayers for his recovery. Soon after this public acknowledgment, however, in favour of Christianity, he died of his loathsome distemper. Constantine, who had become a great favourer of the Christians, marched against Maxentius, who opposed him with an army of one hundred and seventy thousand foot, and eighteen thousand horse; after a very fierce and bloody battle, Maxentius was defeated by Constantine, who, having upon this victory secured to himself the whole empire of the west, gave free liberty to Christians openly to profess their religion. But in the east, Maximian revoked the liberties which had been granted to the Christians, and made war against Licinius; being defeated, however, with great slaughter of his numerous army, he put many heathen priests and soothsayers to death as cheats. But not long after, when he was endeavouring to try the event of a second battle, he was seized with a violent distemper, attended with intolerable pains and torments all over his body; so that, after being wasted to a skeleton, and becoming quite blind, he at length died in rage and despair; confessing, upon his death-bed, that his torments were a just punishment upon him for his malicious and unprovoked proceedings against Christ and his religion.
Constantine and Licinius now remained sole emperors, the former in the west, and the latter in the east. Licinius having cruelly persecuted the Christians in his part of the empire, a war broke out between him and Constantine, in which Licinius was overcome, and forced to flee; and after renewing the war, and carrying it on with greater fury than before, he was again defeated in a general battle, in which it is said one hundred thousand men were slain. He also was taken prisoner, and though his life was then spared, yet upon new attempts against the life of Constantine, he was put to death, and with him ended all the heathen power of Rome. Thus, by great and frequent calamities, in which so many emperors had their share one after another, this wonderful change was wrought in the heathen Roman empire. So that their power to oppress and persecute the Christians fell, never to rise again; and, together with it, fell the pagan superstition and idolatry. This part of history, as Lowman observes, is very proper to the general design of this whole revelation; to support the patience, and encourage the perseverance of the church, by such an instance of Gods power and faithfulness in the protection of the religion of Christ, and punishment of its enemies. We see in this period, during the persecution of heathen Rome, the church in a state of great trial and suffering, and yet preserved and protected, and finally obtaining a state of peace and safety, when all the power of its persecutors was totally destroyed by Gods overruling providence. Thus this history confirms the general truth of all the prophecies: and the particular predictions of each of them severally: a strong encouragement to the patience and constancy of the true church.
6:12 {9} And I beheld when he had opened the sixth seal, and, lo, there was a great earthquake; and the sun became black as {c} sackcloth of hair, and the moon became as blood;
(9) The sixth sign, a narration, has two parts: the sign and the event. The sign is that the earth, heaven, and the things that are in them, for the horror of the sins of the world after those most heavy warnings from God, and complaints of the saints shall be shaken most severely, trembling in horrible manner, and losing their light, in this verse: things falling from heaven Rev 6:13 withdrawing themselves and fleeing from the greatness of the trouble Rev 6:14 . So completely do all creatures depend on the will of God, and content themselves in his glory.
(c) So they called in old time those woven works that were of hair.
6. The sixth seal 6:12-17
The scene now shifts back to earth.
"The entire passage in every clause utilizes well known prophetic anticipations of the day of the Lord, and by his use of these images John identifies the day for his readers. One may check this by consulting the chief scriptures John employs, notably Joe 2:10; Joe 2:30 f., Isa 13:9 ff; Isa 2:10 ff; Isa 34:4, Eze 32:7 f., Hos 10:8. These passages depict the concomitants of the day of the Lord and supply John with all his pictures." [Note: Beasley-Murray, p. 138.]
The eschatological day of the Lord in prophecy includes a time of judgment (the Tribulation) followed by a time of blessing (the Millennium).
Next God will send a tremendous earthquake that will rock the whole world (cf. Luk 21:11). The darkening of the sun (cf. Isa 13:10; Eze 32:7-8; Joe 2:10; Joe 2:31; Amo 8:9; Mat 24:29; Mar 13:24-25; Luk 21:25), the reddening of the moon (cf. Joe 2:31; Act 2:20), and the falling of the stars to earth (a meteor-like shower?) appear from the context to be consequences of this judgment. A less likely possibility is that they will be unrelated phenomena.
That the stars do not literally fall but appear to do so seems clear from the fact that they are still in place in Rev 8:12. This fact suggests that we should also understand the other phenomena described here as appearing to happen, how these things will look as people on earth view them.
Many commentators have taken this description as picturing a metaphorical convulsion among the nations, not a literal shaking of the earth and the heavens. Beale, for example, saw it as a metaphor describing God’s judgment of all sinners just before the last judgment, which he saw taking place at Christ’s second coming. [Note: Beale, p. 398.] We should probably take them literally for at least two reasons. First, Jesus used the same language in the Olivet Discourse and gave no indication that it was symbolic (cf. Mat 24:7; Mar 13:8; Luk 21:11). Second, a shaking of the nations follows in Rev 6:15-17.
Fuente: Commentary Series on the Bible by Peter Pett
Fuente: Everett’s Study Notes on the Holy Scriptures
Fuente: Everett’s Study Notes on the Holy Scriptures
Fuente: The Popular Commentary on the Bible by Kretzmann
This vision seems to represent the utter and irrecoverable overthrow of Heathenism, when that wonderful revolution was brought about in the empire, and, under Constantine, idolatry was abolished, the idols of Paganism destroyed, and all those who had before been the inveterate enemies of the Christian name, covered with confusion.
And what is here presented in vision, will be most emphatically verified in the great day of the perdition of ungodly men; when, trembling before the intolerable wrath of an offended Judge, in vain the mountains and rocks will be invoked to fall on the sinner’s guilty head: naked and defenceless, he must be exposed to all the furious blasts of vengeance, and sink down into everlasting burnings, under black unfathomable despair! Lord, gather not my soul with sinners!
Fuente: Commentary on the Holy Bible by Thomas Coke
Fuente: Heinrich August Wilhelm Meyer’s New Testament Commentary
Fuente: Hawker’s Poor Man’s Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
Fuente: John Trapp’s Complete Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
Fuente: Henry Alford’s Greek Testament
Fuente: The Expositors Greek Testament by Robertson
Fuente: The Expositors Greek Testament by Robertson
Fuente: You Can Understand the Bible: Study Guide Commentary Series by Bob Utley
Fuente: Companion Bible Notes, Appendices and Graphics
Fuente: The Greek Testament
Fuente: Spurgeon’s Verse Expositions of the Bible
Fuente: Gnomon of the New Testament
Fuente: Old and New Testaments Restoration Commentary
Fuente: The Treasury of Scripture Knowledge
Fuente: Combined Bible Commentary
Fuente: A Popular Commentary on the New Testament
Fuente: Expository Notes with Practical Observations on the New Testament
Fuente: Gary Hampton Commentary on Selected Books
Fuente: Joseph Bensons Commentary on the Old and New Testaments
Fuente: Geneva Bible Notes
Fuente: Expository Notes of Dr. Constable (Old and New Testaments)
Fuente: Expository Notes of Dr. Constable (Old and New Testaments)