In this post, we continue applying our prophetic model—inmillennialism—to John’s third vision in which he hears seven trumpets.
The sixth trumpet and the following interlude pose several difficulties. Speaking of Revelation 11, which describes this part of the vision, Alan F. Johnson says:
Some have considered this chapter one of the most difficult to interpret in the Book of Revelation (Lilje, p. 159). Alford agrees: “This passage . . . is undoubtedly one of the most difficult in the whole Apocalypse” (Alf, 4:655). In it John refers to the temple, the Holy City, and the two prophets who are killed by the beast and after three and one-half days are resurrected and ascend to heaven. Does John intend all this to be understood simply as it is given—viz., the literal temple in Jerusalem; two people prophesying for 1,260 days, who are killed by the Antichrist, raised from the dead, and ascend to heaven; a great earthquake that kills seven thousand people and the survivors of which glorify God? Or does he intend all or part of these as symbols representing something? Most commentators take at least part of these things as symbolic.1
We cannot resolve all these challenges with certainty, but inmillennialism can at least suggest good options.
Sixth Trumpet—An Army Released
The sixth trumpet (Rev. 9:13 – 11:13) releases a destructive army controlled by “the four angels which are bound in the great river Euphrates. . . . And the number of the army of the horsemen were two hundred thousand thousand” (Rev. 9:14, 16).
This passage provides an interesting example of how a kernel of physical and historical reality lives inside layers of prophetic imagery. The Jews had experienced a similar physical reality several times over the centuries. This image of an army approaching from the Euphrates River had deep significance for them. Jay Adams says
The second woe [i. e., the sixth trumpet] may be interpreted . . . as a picture of the invasion itself. It was across the Euphrates that Israel’s conquerors had previously come—Assyria, Babylon, Medo-Persia. Moreover, there were places at this very time where Roman armies were stationed along the Euphrates.2
Adams supports his statement by referring to a passage in Josephus that describes the Romans’ celebratory activities after they destroyed the Temple and Jerusalem. Titus, the son of Vespasian and now commander of the Roman armies, “stayed three days among the principle commanders, and so long feasted with them, he sent away the rest of his army to the several places where they would be every one best situated; but permitted the tenth legion to stay, as a guard at Jerusalem, and did not send them away beyond Euphrates, where they had been before.”3 The armies that destroyed the Temple in AD 70 were, in fact, “released” from “the great river Euphrates.”
David Chilton lists several passages that refer to destroying armies that crossed this river in Israel’s past. He then comes to the same conclusion as Adams:
The Euphrates River formed the boundary between Israel and the fearsome, alien forces which God used as a scourge against his rebellious people. “It was the northern frontier of Palestine [cf. Gen. 15:18; Deut. 11:24; Josh. 1:4], across which Assyrian, Babylonian, and Persian invaders had come to impose their pagan sovereignty on the people of God. All the scriptural warnings about a foe from the north, therefore, find their echo in John’s bloodcurdling vision” (cf. Jer. 6:1, 22; 10:22; 13:20; 25:9, 26; 46:20, 24; 47:2; Ezek. 26:7; 38:6, 15; 39:2).4
As it actually worked out in history, the Jewish rebellion in reaction to the ‘locust plague’ of Gessius Florus during the summer of 66 provoked Cestius’ invasion of Palestine in the fall, with large numbers of mounted troops from the regions near the Euphrates.5
The stained glass6 in the picture above shows how these events continued to influence Israel through the centuries. An Assyrian army is crossing the Euphrates River as recorded in Judith, a book in the Apocrypha.7 King Nebuchadrezzar has sent his general, Holofernes, to punish certain rebellious nations. When the army invades Israel, Judith, a beautiful Jewess, devises a way to deliver her people. The story connects Israel’s danger to the Euphrates.
This fictional account appeared about 200 years before John saw his trumpet vision. It contains several historical errors, but shows the ongoing Jewish fear of a destroying army invading from beyond the Euphrates. John’s imagery would have revived this fear ingrained in the Jewish imagination.
Milton Terry reminds us to link the armies of this passage to Jesus’s Olivet Discourse: “The Roman army was composed of soldiers from many nations, and fitly corresponds with the abomination of desolation spoken of in our Lord’s discourse (Matt. 24:15). When ye see Jerusalem compassed with armies, then know that her desolation is at hand (Luke 21:20).”8
The release of these armies from the Euphrates fits into inmillennialism well.
Sixth Trumpet—Christ Descends
During the interval between the sixth and seventh trumpets, John sees a “strong messenger coming down out of the heaven . . . [and] place his right foot upon the sea, and the left upon the land” (Rev. 10:1–2, YLT).
John Gill says this is Christ,
as appears both by comparing this with Dan. 12:7 and [Dan. 10:5–6] and from the power he gave to the two witnesses, [Rev. 11:3] which can’t agree with a created angel; and besides, who so proper to hold the book open as he who unloosed the seals, and opened it, and to whom the epithet mighty may be applied in the highest sense, as God; and who as man may be said to swear by the living God, and to whom the whole description well agrees?9
Two details of the prophetic imagery link this passage (Rev. 10:1–7) to Jesus’s Olivet Discourse. First, Christ—the Strong Messenger—descends “clothed with a cloud” (Rev. 10:1). This reminds us of what Jesus said would happen at the end of the “great tribulation.” The apostate Jews would “see the Son of man coming in the clouds of heaven with power and great glory” (Matt. 24:21, 30; emphasis added). All the tribes of the land (Gk. gē) would mourn. The Revelation agrees with the Olivet Discourse in this particular.
Second, when Christ descended, “there would be no more delay . . . the mystery of God would be fulfilled, just as he announced to his servants the prophets” (Rev. 10:6–7, ESV). The meaning of the term “mystery” is critical for understanding how this completion relates to the Olivet Discourse. It means “the content of that which has not been known before but which has been revealed to an in-group or restricted constituency.”10
The prophets had foretold the coming Messianic Age, but none of them understood how all the parts would come together. To them it was a “mystery” in the sense that its details remained hidden.
The revelation of the “mystery” came during the “last days” (Heb. 1:2) of the Mosaic Age. For example, the Apostle Paul said the unveiling of this “mystery” defined his ministry (1 Cor. 4:1). It involved the relationship between Israel after the flesh and Israel after the Spirit (Rom. 11:25). Paul said God has
made known unto us the mystery of his will, according to his good pleasure which he hath purposed in himself: That in the dispensation of the fulness of times he might gather together in one all things in Christ, both which are in heaven, and which are on earth; even in him: In whom also we have obtained an inheritance, being predestinated according to the purpose of him who worketh all things after the counsel of his own will. (Eph 1:9–11; emphasis added.)
And, that “which in other ages was not made known unto the sons of men . . . is now revealed unto his holy apostles and prophets by the Spirit; That the Gentiles should be fellowheirs, and of the same body, and partakers of his promise in Christ by the gospel” (Eph 3:5–6; cf. Eph. 3:1–14; 5:32; 6:19).
This “same body” mode of existence would characterize the Messianic Age and provide a stark contrast to the Mosaic Age. In the Olivet Discourse, Jesus said the end of the Mosaic Age would come after the “great tribulation” when the Temple fell (Matt. 24:1–3, 21, 34). The parousia (presence) of Christ with his church in the Messianic Age would remain. In this new age, things long hidden would be clear. The “mystery,” in the above sense, would no longer exist.
John’s vision matches this perfectly. After the “great tribulation” of the judgment visions,11 there would be nothing left to reveal regarding the establishment of Messianic-Age unity in Christ. The “mystery” of how God would establish the Messianic Age would be finished.
The sounding of the seventh trumpet completed the transition to the new age; it completed the mystery. This is the same framework we saw in the Olivet Discourse.
Conclusion
Our discussion of the kingdom introduced by the seventh trumpet must await our next post. Speaking of which, I should say these posts have grown much longer than I expected. I must ask the reader to forgive me for breaking my promise to finish the trumpet vision with this post. We will need more posts still.
We end by observing that inmillennialism provides a good explanation for several difficult aspects of this vision. Nothing we have encountered in the Revelation suggests the model is faulty and many features suggest its validity.
Footnotes
- Alan F. Johnson, “Revelation,” in The Expositor’s Bible Commentary: Hebrews through Revelation, ed. Frank E. Gaebelein, vol. 12 (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan Publishing House, 1981), 499. The “Alf, 4:655” reference is Henry Alford, Alford’s Greek Testament: An Exegetical and Critical Commentary, (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker, 1980), 4:655.
- Jay E. Adams, The Time is At Hand: Prophecy and the Book of Revelation, (Woodruff, SC: Timeless Texts, 2000), 66.
- Flavius Josephus, The Wars of the Jews, (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker, 1974), 7:1:3. Emphasis added.
- David Chilton, The Days of Vengeance: An Exposition of the Book of Revelation, (Tyler, TX: Dominion Press, 1987), 250. Chilton is quoting G. B. Caird, The Revelation of St. John the Divine, (New York: Harper & Row, 1966), 122.
- Chilton, The Days of Vengeance, 252. Emphasis added.
- An unknown French artist created this rondel around 1246-48 AD. It is now in the Philadelphia Museum of Art. The digital file (here) is in the public domain (PD-1923).
- This “book is in reality a novel” written in the second century BC. — W. O. E. Oesterley, An Introduction to the Books of the Apocrypha (New York: The Macmillan Company, 1935), 178, 180.
- Milton S. Terry, Biblical Hermeneutics: A Treatise on the Interpretation of the Old and New Testaments, Vol. 2, Library of Biblical and Theological Literature (New York: Eaton & Mains, 1890), 362. Biblical references modernized.
- John Gill, An Exposition of the Old and New Testaments, The Baptist Commentary Series (Paris, AR: The Baptist Standard Bearer, 1989), 9:759. Biblical references updated to generate automatic links.
- Johannes P. Louw and Eugene Albert Nida, Greek-English Lexicon of the New Testament: Based on Semantic Domains (New York: United Bible Societies, 1996), 344.
- See The Bookends of Revelation and Mapping God’s Highway in Revelation for an outline of the visions.
