And in those days shall men seek death, and shall not find it; and shall desire to die, and death shall flee from them.
6. shall flee ] Lit. fleeth.
Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges
And in those days shall men seek death … – See the notes on Rev 9:5. It is very easy to conceive of such a state of things as is here described, and, indeed, this has not been very uncommon in the world. It is a state where the distress is so great that people would consider death a relief, and where they anxiously look to the time when they may be released from their sufferings by death. In the case before us it is not intimated that they would lay violent hands on themselves, or that they would take any positive measures to end their sufferings; and this, perhaps, may be a circumstance of some importance to show that the persons referred to were servants of God. When it is said that they would seek death, it can only be meant that they would look out for it – or desire it – as the end of their sorrows. This is descriptive, as we shall see, of a particular period of the world; but the language is beautifully applicable to what occurs in all ages and in all lands.
There is always a great number of sufferers who are looking forward to death as a relief. In cells and dungeons; on beds of pain and languishing; in scenes of poverty and want; in blighted hopes and disappointed affections, how many are there who would be glad to die, and who have no hope of an end of suffering but in the grave! A few, by the pistol, by the halter, by poison, or by drowning, seek thus to end their woes. A large part look forward to death as a release, when, if the reality were known, death would furnish no such relief, for there are deeper and longer woes beyond the grave than there are this side of it. Compare the notes on Job 3:20-22. But to a portion death will be a relief. It will be an end of sufferings. They will find peace in the grave, and are assured they shall suffer no more. Such bear their trials with patience, for the end of all sorrow to them is near, and death will come to release their spirits from the suffering clay, and to bear them in triumph to a world where a pang shall never be felt, and a tear never shed.
Fuente: Albert Barnes’ Notes on the Bible
Verse 6. In those days shall men seek death] So distressing shall be their sufferings and torment that they shall long for death in any form, to be rescued from the evils of life. There is a sentiment much like this in Maximianus, Eleg. i., ver. 111, commonly attributed to Cornelius Gallus:-
Nunc quia longa mihi gravis est et inutilis aetas,
Vivere cum nequeam, sit mihi posse mori?
O quam dura premit miseros conditio vitae!
Nec mors humano subjacet arbitrio.
Dulce mori miseris; sed mors optata recedit:
At cum tristis erit, praecipitata venit.
“Seeing that long life is both useless and burdensome
When we can no longer live comfortably, shall we be
permitted to die?
O how hard is the condition on which we hold life!
For death is not subjected to the will of man.
To die is sweet to the wretched; but wished-for death
flees away.
Yet when it is not desired, it comes with the hastiest
strides.”
Job expresses the same sentiment, in the most plaintive manner: –
Why is light given to the miserable,
And life to the bitter of soul?
Who wait for death, but it is not;
And dig for it more than hid treasures.
They rejoice for it, and are glad,
And exult when they find the grave.
Job 3:20-22.
Fuente: Adam Clarke’s Commentary and Critical Notes on the Bible
The calamities of those days shall be so great, that men shall be weary of their lives.
Fuente: English Annotations on the Holy Bible by Matthew Poole
6. shall desireGreek,“eagerly desire”; set their mind on.
shall fleeSo B,Vulgate, Syriac, and Coptic read. But A and Alephread, “fleeth,” namely continually. In Re6:16, which is at a later stage of God’s judgments, the ungodlyseek annihilation, not from the torment of their suffering, but fromfear of the face of the Lamb before whom they have to stand.
Fuente: Jamieson, Fausset and Brown’s Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible
And in those days men shall seek death,…. Or desire to die, as Job did:
and shall not find it; or shall not die:
and shall desire to die, and death shall flee from them; death will be preferred to a miserable life; it will be chosen rather than life, Jer 8:3. The ravages of the Saracens, their incursions, and the invasions by them, struck such terror into the inhabitants of divers parts of the empire, that they made death more eligible to them than life.
Fuente: John Gill’s Exposition of the Entire Bible
Men ( ). Generic use of the article (men as a class).
Shall not find it ( ). Strong double negative with the future active indicative according to Aleph Q, but (second aorist active subjunctive) according to A P (either construction regular). The idea here is found in Job 3:21; Jer 8:3. “Such a death as they desire, a death which will end their sufferings, is impossible; physical death is no remedy for the of an evil conscience” (Swete).
They shall desire to die ( ). Future active of , a climax to (they shall seek), to desire vehemently. Paul in Php 1:23 shows a preference for death if his work is done, in order to be with Christ, a very different feeling from what we have here.
Fleeth (). Vivid futuristic present active indicative of . Even death does not come to their relief.
Fuente: Robertson’s Word Pictures in the New Testament
Men. Rather, the men : those tormented.
Shall desire [] . Epi has the force of vehemently, earnestly.
Shall flee [] . Read feugei fleeth. Aeschylus says : “Not justly do mortals hate death, since it is the greatest deliverance from their many woes” (” Fragment “). Herodotus relates the address of Artabanus to Xerxes, when the latter wept on beholding his vast armament. “There is no man, whether it be here among this multitude or elsewhere, who is so happy as not to have felt the wish – I will not say once, but full many a time – that he were dead rather than alive. Calamities fall upon us, sicknesses vex and harass us, and make life, short though it be, to appear long. So death, through the wretchedness of our life, is a most sweet refuge to our race” (7, 46).
Fuente: Vincent’s Word Studies in the New Testament
1) “And in those days shall men seek death,” (kai entois hemerais ekeinas) “And in those days” (zetesousin hoi anthropoi ton thanaton) “The men (without the seal of God) will seek death; crying in tormented fear, hysteria, and excruciating pain for rocks and mountains to fall on, crush them, to kill them, Rev 6:16; Isa 2:19; Luk 23:30.
2) “And shall not find it,” (kai oume heuresousin auton) “And they will by no means at all find it; they can not (will not) find death by suicide or from any other means for these five tragic torment filled months, when death will be on a vacation, by Divine intervention, so hat Satan can not kill, Heb 2:14; Hos 10:8.
3) “And shall desire to die,” (kai epithumesousin apothanein) “And they will yearn or long to die; Job 3:21; “which long for death, but it cometh not,” Jer 8:3. Yes, Christ-rejecting men, when it is too late to repent, will desire to die, to be annihilated, put out of existence, but they can not, because of their wilful, obstinate rebellion against God, Pro 1:22-30.
4) “And death shall flee from them,” (kai pheugei ho thanatos ap’ auton) “And the death (they long for), a release from torment, flees from them; Luk 23:30. It is said that the stinging scorpion can and will commit suicide by stinging itself thru its own brain when it is hemmed in or caught by fire and near suffocating smoke, but man can not even commit suicide when this hour of torment comes upon those who have wilfully ignored God’s call to prepare to meet him, Luk 21:34-36. For illustration read the preceding poem, Mat 24:44; Heb 9:27-28.
Fuente: Garner-Howes Baptist Commentary
(6) And in those days . . .Translate, And in those days men shall seek death, and shall not find it; and they shall yearn to die, and death flees from them. The change of tense from the future (shall seek shall yearn) to the present (death flees) gives graphic force to the description. Men will seek for death in vain; they will long to die, and lo ! death is seen fleeing from them. We can see an age in which death will be regarded as a sweet respite from the tormenting trials of life: men will stretch out their hands to death as to a welcome deliverer; but behold! death is seen fleeing from them. The word translated desire in our English version is a strong word; it has been rendered vehemently desire: it is a passionate longing, as the yearning of the soul after one we love. There have been ages in which men have thus pined for death, in which light and life seem but mockeries to the miserable, and men long for death, but it cometh not; and dig for it more than for hid treasures (Job. 3:20-21). Such times are those which have been well called reigns of terror.
Fuente: Ellicott’s Commentary for English Readers (Old and New Testaments)
6. In those days The days of the five locustine months; the periods of a man’s subjection to infernal error.
Seek death A most intense trait of misery under sin. Life is a pessimism, and death is subjectively looked for as a deliverer.
Not find it Not but that death will find them: for men will die. But they will subjectively prefer the sudden death of slaughter (ver.
19) to their long, scorpion-like agonies. Note on Rev 6:16.
Flee from them A slight personification. Their imaginary deliverer takes to flight. Indeed, should he make the serious offer, he might not be so welcome, after all.
Fuente: Whedon’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments
Rev 9:6 . . , viz., when what has been previously seen by John in the vision actually occurs. Just upon the fact that the vision represents prophetically what is to occur, [2554] depends the express prophetic mode of expression in the fut. , together with the formula . . . [2555] Not only is the wish described that the wounds inflicted by the locusts might be mortal, [2556] but, in general, the despairing desire to see an end made to life, and thus to escape [2557] the dreadful tortures, [2558] a terrible counterpart to the of the apostle springing from the holiest hope. [2559]
[2554] Cf. Rev 4:1 , Rev 5:1 sqq.
[2555] Cf. Ewald, De Wette.
[2556] De Wette.
[2557] Cf. Jer 8:3 .
[2558] Rev 9:5 .
[2559] Phi 1:23 .
Fuente: Heinrich August Wilhelm Meyer’s New Testament Commentary
6 And in those days shall men seek death, and shall not find it; and shall desire to die, and death shall flee from them.
Ver. 6. Shall men seek death ] Being brought through anguish of conscience, and fear of wrath, to that pitiful plight that Roger Bishop of Salisbury was, in King Stephen’s time, through long and strait imprisonment. He was so hardly bestead (saith the historian) ut vivere noluerit, mori nescierit, that live he would not, die he could not Popish pardons, pilgrimages, dirges, &c., would not quiet or cure distempered consciences, or shake out the envenomed arrows of the Almighty, that stuck fast in them, haeret lateri lethalis arundo. A broken leg is not eased by a silken stocking. Nescio quomodo imbecillior est medicina quam morbus, said Cicero of his philosophical consolations; so may these well say of their Popish paltry applications, The medicine is too weak for the malady. The Papists say, that the reformed religion is a doctrine of desperation. This we are sure is true of theirs, as were easy to instance in Stephen Gardiner, Dr Pendleton, Francis Spira, Guarlaeus, Bomelins, Latomus, Crescentius.
Fuente: John Trapp’s Complete Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
Rev 9:6 . The withholding of death, instead of being an alleviation, is really a refinement of torture; so infernal is the pain, that the sufferers crave, but crave in vain, for death (Sibyll. iii. 208: ). It is singular that suicide is never contemplated, although it was widely prevalent at this period in certain circles of the Empire (see Merivale’s Romans under the Empire , ch. 64; Lecky’s Europ. Morals , i. 212 f.). For its un-Jewish character see Jos. Bell . iii. 8.5.
Fuente: The Expositors Greek Testament by Robertson
seek. As in Rom 2:7.
not. The texts read “in nowise”, the strong negative. App-105.
shall flee = fleeth.
Fuente: Companion Bible Notes, Appendices and Graphics
shall men: Rev 6:16, 2Sa 1:9, Job 3:20-22, Job 7:15, Job 7:16, Isa 2:19, Jer 8:3, Hos 10:8, Joh 4:8, Joh 4:9, Luk 23:30
Reciprocal: Deu 28:67 – General Jdg 8:21 – Rise thou Job 3:21 – long Job 6:9 – that it would Psa 59:11 – Slay Isa 15:4 – his Jon 4:9 – even Zec 14:12 – Their flesh
Fuente: The Treasury of Scripture Knowledge
Rev 9:6. Seek death and shall not find it. There are some things worse than death (Jer 8:3). I once heard a lecture by a woman who had escaped from the clutches of Rome. In that lecture the speaker related the experiences of a woman who was being tortured as a result of self-inflicted wounds induced by the heresies of Rome. This victim moaned and sighed as if death at once would have been a relief.
Comments by Foy E. Wallace
Verse 6.
Seeking death–“In those days shall men seek death, and shall not find it”–Rev 9:6.
For comparison read Luk 21:26, Mat 24:22, and Mar 13:12; Mar 13:20 -the Lord’s own predictions concerning these events. There could be no fitter application of these symbols than the tragic conditions attending the siege of Jerusalem, as described in the graphic language of Matthew, Mark and Luke.
Fuente: Combined Bible Commentary
Rev 9:6. So terrible is the plague that men shall eagerly, but in vain, desire to die a point reached under the sixth seal, but now under the fifth trumpet,the usual climax of the Apocalypse. Before passing on it may be well to notice the remarkable double reference to the book of Job in these verses. There, as here in Rev 9:5, Satan was restrained when the patriarch was delivered into his hands (Job 2:6). There, as here, the smitten one longed to die (Job 3:11; Job 3:20-21). This double reference must be considered as conclusive upon the point that Job is in the Apostles eye; and, if so, nothing more is needed to convince us that the locust-plague is demoniacal not earthly in its origin.
Fuente: A Popular Commentary on the New Testament
Because of the influence of these scorpion-like locusts, people will seek death but will not be able to escape their pain. They long for death rather than repenting.
Since Revelation 4 :1 John had been reporting what he saw, but now he spoke as a prophet predicting the future.
"For the first time the Apostle ceases to be the exponent of what he saw, and becomes the direct organ of the Spirit . . ." [Note: Alford, 4:641.]
This is one of the indications that Revelation is prophetic rather than only apocalyptic in genre.