Two Woes More.
Revelation 9:12-2112One woe is past; and, behold, there come two woes more hereafter. 13And the sixth angel sounded, and I heard a voice from the four horns of the golden altar which is before God, 14Saying to the sixth angel which had the trumpet, Loose the four angels which are bound in the great river Euphrates. 15And the four angels were loosed, which were prepared for an hour, and a day, and a month, and a year, for to slay the third part of men. 16And the number of the army of the horsemen were two hundred thousand thousand: and I heard the number of them. 17And thus I saw the horses in the vision, and them that sat on them, having breastplates of fire, and of jacinth, and brimstone: and the heads of the horses were as the heads of lions; and out of their mouths issued fire and smoke and brimstone. 18By these three was the third part of men killed, by the fire, and by the smoke, and by the brimstone, which issued out of their mouths. 19For their power is in their mouth, and in their tails: for their tails were like unto serpents, and had heads, and with them they do hurt. 20And the rest of the men which were not killed by these plagues yet repented not of the works of their hands, that they should not worship devils, and idols of gold, and silver, and brass, and stone, and of wood: which neither can see, nor hear, nor walk: 21Neither repented they of their murders, nor of their sorceries, nor of their fornication, nor of their thefts. (Revelation 9:12‑21).
“One woe is past; and, behold, there come two woes more” (vs. 12).
For the interpretation of these woes we must look on to the future, and not back to the past. We must ever bear in mind that from chapter 4. onward in this book we are in the midst of scenes and judgments which will find their fulfillment in that short period that follows the removal of the Church at the coming of the Lord. We do not deny that certain historical events bear a kind of analogy to what is given in this chapter, but that is an application, and not the interpretation of the passage.
The first woe has been called SATAN’S woe, for the pit of the abyss and the angel of the abyss are prominent features of the scourge that is to fall on apostate Israel, “the men who have not the seal of God on their foreheads” (cf. ch. 7). This second woe is MAN’S woe for human instrumentality is conspicuous.
“And the sixth angel sounded, and I heard a voice from the four horns of the golden altar which is before God, “Saying to the sixth angel which had the trumpet, Loose the four angels which are bound in the great river Euphrates.
“And the four angels were loosed, which were prepared for an hour, and a day, and a month, and a year, for to slay the third part of men.
“And the number of the army of the horsemen were two hundred thousand thousand; and I heard the number of them.”
The Golden Altar.
Two things seem prominent in connection with the golden altar—atonement and intercession. When the Lord gave instruction to Moses with reference to the making of the tabernacle, he was enjoined to burn incense upon the golden altar morning and evening; there was to be a “perpetual incense before the Lord” (Ex. 30:88And when Aaron lighteth the lamps at even, he shall burn incense upon it, a perpetual incense before the Lord throughout your generations. (Exodus 30:8)).
We are also told that the blood of the sin offering was to be placed upon its horns once a year on the great day of atonement (Ex. 30:1010And Aaron shall make an atonement upon the horns of it once in a year with the blood of the sin offering of atonements: once in the year shall he make atonement upon it throughout your generations: it is most holy unto the Lord. (Exodus 30:10); Lev. 16:1818And he shall go out unto the altar that is before the Lord, and make an atonement for it; and shall take of the blood of the bullock, and of the blood of the goat, and put it upon the horns of the altar round about. (Leviticus 16:18)). Besides this the blood of the special sin offering for “the priest that is anointed,” and for “the whole congregation” was to be placed upon the horns of the golden altar (Lev. 4:7,187And the priest shall put some of the blood upon the horns of the altar of sweet incense before the Lord, which is in the tabernacle of the congregation; and shall pour all the blood of the bullock at the bottom of the altar of the burnt offering, which is at the door of the tabernacle of the congregation. (Leviticus 4:7)
18And he shall put some of the blood upon the horns of the altar which is before the Lord, that is in the tabernacle of the congregation, and shall pour out all the blood at the bottom of the altar of the burnt offering, which is at the door of the tabernacle of the congregation. (Leviticus 4:18)).
How solemn to find that the voice comes from the horns of this same golden altar, no longer now speaking of intercession and atonement, but releasing the four angels of judgment which were bound at the great river Euphrates. Another has written:— “We have no record in the Word of the binding of these four angels until here recorded; but we know from Peter and Jude that the angels who kept not their place and dwelling—tampering with humans, as humans now do with demons—are kept in eternal chains until the final reckoning; four of these being, as we here find, bound at the scene of crime, the river of Babylon. Here we find them loosed for the appointed time... The function of the four angels is to kill the third part of men, with an army of cavalry numbering 200,000,000.” (Hartridge.)
If under the fifth trumpet we find ourselves in connection with Palestine, under the sixth our attention is called to the Far East. These two trumpets correspond by way of contrast to the two companies saved during the parenthesis of mercy in Revelation 7—the one from the tribes of Israel, the other from amongst the Gentile nations.
It is to be noticed that these four angels were “prepared.” Only now was the time ripe for the execution of this particular judgment, but known unto God are all His works, even works of judgment, and this judgment will fall specially upon Europe.
The Euphratean Horsemen.
Whatever application may be made of this inroad of Euphratean horsemen along the lines of the historicist interpretation of the Apocalypse we believe that the complete and final fulfillment lies in the future, but that future seems now to be very near at hand.
Those who interpret it according to the futurist method have limited the sphere of execution of the judgment to Western Europe, in other words to the Roman Empire. They have done so by confining the expression the third part “to the Western portion of the Empire as it existed in the past. Personally, we are coming more and more to the conviction that more is to be taken literally than hitherto we have been disposed to do. Twice over is the expression used— “to slay the third part of men” (vs. 15)— “by these three was the third part of men killed” (vs. 18).
This is awful to contemplate—a wholesale destruction of humanity. Before 1914 it would have been incredible that as the result of a war something like 100,000,000 lives would be lost. Since then the war-like spirit amongst the nations of the whole earth, East and West, has increased a hundred-fold, and methods of destruction have been invented more terrifying than before. The Far East is being organized for the approaching conflict. China alone possesses a quarter of the population of the earth. Then there are Japan, India, Russia. All these lands are seething with unrest. Humanity is digging its own grave. Psalms 9. is yet to be fulfilled—
“The nations are sunk down in the pit that they made: in the net which they hid is their own foot taken.”
Under the fourth seal, the fourth part of men is slain as the result of their own wicked devices (Rev. 6:88And I looked, and behold a pale horse: and his name that sat on him was Death, and Hell followed with him. And power was given unto them over the fourth part of the earth, to kill with sword, and with hunger, and with death, and with the beasts of the earth. (Revelation 6:8)). We are told that the population of the earth is about 1,600,000,000 (sixteen hundred million) If a fourth part are slain, twelve hundred million would remain. The seals and trumpets follow in quick succession during the brief interval of seven years between the rapture of the saints and the appearing of Christ with all His saints, so that we may take 1,200,000,000 to be still roughly the population of the earth at the time of the sounding of the sixth trumpet. Under this trumpet a “third part” of men will be killed, that is, a third part of what is left, or 400,000,000.
This seems too awful to be true, but let us remember that the army of invasion will be 200,000,000 (Rev. 9:1616And the number of the army of the horsemen were two hundred thousand thousand: and I heard the number of them. (Revelation 9:16)), and this number is emphasized. I heard the number of them.
The Assyrian of Prophecy.
If in the first part of the chapter we find the early actings of Antichrist in Palestine, hero we seem to be brought in contact with the commencing activities of the Assyrian of prophecy. There is to be a great northeastern confederacy of nations, the Gog of Ezekiel, and the Assyrian of Isaiah and Micah. At the close of the career of the Assyrian, before he falls on the mountains of Judea, he comes in special contact with the land of Palestine as the King of the North of Daniel 11 But here in Revelation 9. it would seem that the Assyrian’s early activities are in Europe, the yellow peril of which we have been hearing so much of late.
What are we to understand by the hour and day, and month and year? Besides the fact of the period of judgment being a limited one, may it not also suggest that there may be a succession of attacks, increasing in severity?
Hordes from the East are to overrun the West. This is what God has distinctly foretold in the prophetic Scriptures, and things politically are working steadily and surely towards this end. One of the earliest and most remarkable prophecies of the O.T. makes this clear―
“Asshur shall carry thee (i.e., Israel) away captive.
“And he took up his parable and said, Alas, who shall live when God doeth this!
“And ships shall come from the side of Chittim and shall afflict Asshur ... and he also (i.e., Chittim) shall perish forever” (Num. 24:20-2520And when he looked on Amalek, he took up his parable, and said, Amalek was the first of the nations; but his latter end shall be that he perish for ever. 21And he looked on the Kenites, and took up his parable, and said, Strong is thy dwellingplace, and thou puttest thy nest in a rock. 22Nevertheless the Kenite shall be wasted, until Asshur shall carry thee away captive. 23And he took up his parable, and said, Alas, who shall live when God doeth this! 24And ships shall come from the coast of Chittim, and shall afflict Asshur, and shall afflict Eber, and he also shall perish for ever. 25And Balaam rose up, and went and returned to his place: and Balak also went his way. (Numbers 24:20‑25)).
Chittim lay west of Palestine, and seems to refer to the Roman Empire, and shows how prophecy anticipated history.
In the description which follows we may see much that is figurative. It does not follow that literal horses are meant, but rather the rapid and onward progress of the evil. Irresistible, too, is the Satanic energy symbolized by the fire, and smoke, and brimstone. Along with military invasion in overwhelming numbers will come the blinding and Satanic influences of false doctrine. In Europe where the gospel of God’s grace has achieved its mighty results in blessing in the past, there the apostasy of rejected light and welcomed heathen darkness will destroy all moral link with God. Even today in favored England are to be found Moslem mosques and Buddhist temples.
“And thus I saw the horses in the vision, and them that sat on them, having breastplates of fire, and of jacinth, and brimstone; and the heads of the horses were as the heads of lions; and out of their mouths issued fire and smoke and brimstone.
By these three was the third part of men killed, by the fire, and by the smoke, and by the brimstone, which issued out of their mouths.
“For their power is in their mouths, and in their tails; for their tails were like unto serpents, and had heads, and with them they do hurt” (9:17-19).
Apostate Christendom filled with violence, corruption, and idolatry will find no place of repentance, but will seek relief from the torment of infidelity in demonology and spiritistic investigations. Compare Saul and the witch of Endor (1 Sam. 28); and also the anguish of the apostate people of Israel in the last days (Isa. 8:19-2219And when they shall say unto you, Seek unto them that have familiar spirits, and unto wizards that peep, and that mutter: should not a people seek unto their God? for the living to the dead? 20To the law and to the testimony: if they speak not according to this word, it is because there is no light in them. 21And they shall pass through it, hardly bestead and hungry: and it shall come to pass, that when they shall be hungry, they shall fret themselves, and curse their king and their God, and look upward. 22And they shall look unto the earth; and behold trouble and darkness, dimness of anguish; and they shall be driven to darkness. (Isaiah 8:19‑22)); only here in Revelation 9. it is Europe that is in question
“And the rest of the men which were not killed by these plagues yet repented not of the works of their hands, that they should not worship devils and idols of gold, and silver, and brass, and stone, and of wood; which neither can see, nor hear, nor walk.
“Neither repented they of their murders, nor of their sorceries, nor of their fornications, nor of their thefts” (vss. 20, 21).