Tagged: Book of Revelation
Until their fellow slaves were killed (Rev. 6:9-11)
Previously: A white robe was given (Rev. 6:9-11)
The scripture
Rev. 6:9 – When He opened the fifth seal, I saw under the altar the souls of those slaughtered because of God’s word and the testimony they had. 10They cried out with a loud voice: “O Lord, holy and true, how long until You judge and avenge our blood from those who live on the earth?” 11So, a white robe was given to each of them, and they were told to rest a little while longer until [the number of] their fellow slaves and their brothers, who were going to be killed just as they had been, would be completed. (HCSB)
Until their fellow slaves were killed
The martyrs are told to rest “until [the number of] their fellow slaves and their brothers, who were going to be killed just as they had been, would be completed” (v. 12). It appears that many more will experience martyrdom before the return of Christ. While we may wonder why God doesn’t put a stop to the killing – some brashly question whether He is able to do so – we may be confident that He is sovereign over human history, causing or allowing all things for reasons we may not fully understand. God has determined that a number of saints will give their lives because of His word and the testimony they have. Only God know when this number – like the measure of sins being filled up by the wicked – will reach capacity.
According to the Journal of the American Academy of Religion, the total number of Christian martyrs in the 20th century alone reached 45 million. How many millions of others have given their lives from the time of Stephen, the first martyr, until now is impossible to know with certainty. But no doubt there is ample room beneath the altar in heaven for those who have identified with the slaughter of the Lamb.
R.J.D. Utley writes, “One of the major truths of this book is that God is in control of all things, even the death of Christian martyrs! All of history is in His hand. God is not surprised by any events, actions or outcomes. Yet there is still pain, suffering and unfairness in this fallen world. This concept of a completed number of martyrs (cf. I Enoch 47:4) is a symbolic way of referring to God’s knowledge and plan for mankind. This is similar to Paul’s concept of ‘the fullness of the Gentiles’ (cf. Rom. 11:12, 25) which refers to God’s knowledge of all the Gentiles who would be saved” (Utley, Hope in Hard Times – The Final Curtain: Revelation, Vol. 12, Study Guide Commentary Series, 63).
Four views
Briefly, here is a summary of the four major views of these verses:
- Most historicists see the fifth seal fulfilled during the rule of Diocletian, who persecuted the church in the last days of his rule from 284 – 304 A.D.
- Preterists argue that the souls under the altar are those of first-century Christians slain at the hands of the Jewish persecutors.
- Futurists contend that these saints are killed during the yet-future Tribulation.
- And spiritualists say this passage reveals the present state of those who already have died for their faith.
In any case, interpreters agree that Jesus comforts His martyrs, grants them rest and assures them that His judgment, whenever it falls, will be swift and sure.
Next: The sixth seal (Rev. 6:12-17)
A white robe was given (Rev. 6:9-11)
Previously: O Lord … how long? (Rev. 6:9-11)
The scripture
Rev. 6:9 – When He opened the fifth seal, I saw under the altar the souls of those slaughtered because of God’s word and the testimony they had. 10They cried out with a loud voice: “O Lord, holy and true, how long until You judge and avenge our blood from those who live on the earth?” 11So, a white robe was given to each of them, and they were told to rest a little while longer until [the number of] their fellow slaves and their brothers, who were going to be killed just as they had been, would be completed. (HCSB)
In response to the martyrs’ question about God’s plans for His day of vengeance, the Lord provides each of them with a white robe, and they are told simply to “rest a little while longer” (v. 11). We see white clothing in other places in Revelation:
- In Christ’s letter to the church at Sardis, He tells them, “but you have a few people in Sardis who have not defiled their clothes, and they will walk with Me in white, because they are worthy. In the same way, the victor will be dressed in white clothes” (Rev. 3:4-5a, emphasis added).
- In Rev. 3:18, Jesus urges the Laodiceans to “buy from Me gold refined in the fire so that you may be rich, and white clothes so that you may be dressed and your shameful nakedness not be exposed …” (emphasis added).
- And in Rev. 4:4, we see that the 24 elders are dressed in white clothes. Surely these white clothes represent the righteousness of Christ.
In Jesus’ parable of the wedding banquet (Matt. 22:1-14), the one thrown into outer darkness is not dressed in appropriate attire. It’s not that he is too poor, or ill-advised; rather, he refuses to wear one of the white robes the host provides freely to all guests. The white robes given to the martyrs in Revelation 6 no doubt symbolize that they were made white by the blood of the Lamb, and that those clothed in Christ’s righteousness may wait in confident expectation that He will avenge their untimely deaths.
Maimonides, one of the great Torah scholars of the Middle Ages, says the Jews used to array priests, when approved of, in white robes; “thus the sense is, they are admitted among the blessed ones, who, as spotless priests, minister unto God and the Lamb” (Jamieson, Fausset, Brown, Rev. 6:11).
The martyrs also are told to rest “a little while longer.” None of them presses the issue by asking, “How long is that?” It seems enough to have God’s assurance that He will be true to His word. The timing of the Lord’s plans for the ages is known only to Him and remains a mystery and at times a matter of considerable debate for us. One reason the Book of Revelation is so difficult to interpret is because of the timing of its content. Have most of these prophecies been fulfilled, as preterists argue? Are they fulfilled at various stages in human history, as historicists contend? Are they yet future, as futurists believe? Are they to be interpreted figuratively rather than literally, as spiritualists argue? Or is there perhaps some element of truth in all of these interpretations, as eclectics say? One thing we all can agree on is that God, who is “holy and true” (v. 10), will fulfill His promises. That truth alone enables the saints to rest.
Nowhere in this passage do the saints seek to take vengeance into their own hands. They know what the Lord has said: “Vengeance belongs to Me; I will repay … As surely as I live forever, when I sharpen My flashing sword, and My hand takes hold of judgment, I will take vengeance on My adversaries and repay those who hate Me” (Deut. 32:35, 40b-41).
It is interesting to note that when Jesus reads from Isaiah 61 in the synagogue in Nazareth and declares that “Today as you listen, this Scripture has been fulfilled” (see Luke 4:16-21), He stops quoting the prophet in mid-sentence. He has declared that his earthly ministry involves preaching good news to the poor, proclaiming freedom to the captives, recovering sight for the blind, setting free the oppressed, and proclaiming the year of the Lord’s favor. But then, abruptly, He stops. If He were to go on, the next line reads, “and the day of our God’s vengeance” (Isa. 61:2). Clearly, Jesus reserves that day of vengeance for a future time more closely associated with His second coming. When we finally get to Rev. 19:2 we see that “He has avenged the blood of His servants …”
The length of the martyrs’ rest is implied but not implicit. It is “a little while,” eti chronon nikron, yet a little time, just a little while. God’s timing is not ours. Peter writes, “Dear friends, don’t let this one thing escape you: with the Lord one day is like 1,000 years, and 1,000 years like one day” (2 Peter 3:8). His delay is an opportunity for repentance (2 Peter 3:9). And judgment most certainly will come, followed by new heavens and a new earth (2 Peter 3:10-13).
Next: Until their fellow slaves were killed (Rev. 6:9-11)
O Lord … how long? (Rev. 6:9-11)
Previously: The souls of those slaughtered (Rev. 6:9-11)
The scripture
Rev. 6:9 – When He opened the fifth seal, I saw under the altar the souls of those slaughtered because of God’s word and the testimony they had. 10They cried out with a loud voice: “O Lord, holy and true, how long until You judge and avenge our blood from those who live on the earth?” 11So, a white robe was given to each of them, and they were told to rest a little while longer until [the number of] their fellow slaves and their brothers, who were going to be killed just as they had been, would be completed (HCSB).
O Lord … how long?
John hears the martyrs in heaven cry out, “O Lord, holy and true, how long until You judge and avenge our blood from those who live on the earth?” (v. 10). A more literal translation asks, “Until when will You exact vengeance for our blood?” Warren Wiersbe raises an interesting question about the verse in his commentary: “But is it ‘Christian’ for these martyred saints to pray for vengeance on their murderers? After all, both Jesus and Stephen prayed that God would forgive those who killed them.”
Wiersbe then offers this insight: “I have no doubt that, when they were slain on earth, these martyrs also prayed for their slayers; and this is the right thing to do (Matt. 5:10–12, 43–48). The great question, however, was not whether their enemies would be judged, but when. ‘How long, O Lord?’ has been the cry of God’s suffering people throughout the ages (see Pss. 74:9–10; 79:5; 94:3–4; also Hab. 1:2). The saints in heaven know that God will eventually judge sin and establish righteousness in the earth, but they do not know God’s exact schedule. It is not personal revenge that they seek, but vindication of God’s holiness and the establishment of God’s justice. Every believer today who sincerely prays, ‘Thy kingdom come!’ is echoing their petition” (The Bible Exposition Commentary, Rev. 6:9).
If we are honest with ourselves, we have to admit there are times we seek God’s justice for our own gratification and not for His glory. We tend to want justice for our enemies and mercy for ourselves. It is the old nature emerging in our words and deeds – and even in the words and deeds of those who walk most closely with the Lord. When a Samaritan village refuses to welcome Jesus, for example, James and John are quick to ask, “Lord, do you want us to call down fire from heaven and consume them?” (Luke 9:54). Jesus quickly rebukes His followers for their fleshly desires in the following verse.
Of course, there is a day coming when the Lord will vanquish His adversaries. Paul writes in 2 Thess. 2:8b, “The Lord Jesus will destroy (“consume” KJV) him [the lawless one] with the breath of His mouth and will bring him to nothing with the brightness of His coming.” And the writer of Hebrews warns that there is a penalty for willful sin, “a terrifying expectation of judgment, and the fury of a fire about to consume the adversaries” (Heb. 10:28).
The martyrs in Revelation 6 are not questioning God’s righteousness; they call Him “holy and true.” Nor are they challenging His patience, for they know He does not want anyone to perish, but all to come to repentance (2 Peter 3:9). It appears they are simply asking God to reveal His timetable – a request He declines, but not without providing the saints with comfort and assurance.
Next: A white robe was given (Rev. 6:9-11)
The souls of those slaughtered (Rev. 6:9-11)
Previously: The fifth seal (Rev. 6:9-11)
The scripture
Rev. 6:9 – When He opened the fifth seal, I saw under the altar the souls of those slaughtered because of God’s word and the testimony they had. 10 They cried out with a loud voice: “O Lord, holy and true, how long until You judge and avenge our blood from those who live on the earth?” 11 So, a white robe was given to each of them, and they were told to rest a little while longer until [the number of] their fellow slaves and their brothers, who were going to be killed just as they had been, would be completed (HCSB).
The souls of those slaughtered
John describes the martyrs as having been “slaughtered because of God’s word and the testimony they had” (v. 9). We are told that John has been exiled to Patmos for similar reasons – “because of God’s word and the testimony about Jesus” (Rev. 1:9). But these saints receive a harsher sentence; they are slaughtered. The Greek word used here is sphazo, which describes the slaying, or cutting, of a sacrifice. They are identified with the Lamb in their death since He, too, is “slaughtered” (Rev. 5:6, 9, 12). The Greek word martus, from which we get the English word martyr, means “a witness” (see Rev. 2:13; 17:6). These saints are slaughtered because of their witness to the truth of God and the message of Jesus Christ.
This is not intended to minimize John’s suffering. According to the testimony of Tertullian, John is thrown into a cauldron of boiling oil in Rome without suffering injury. Perhaps in exasperation – we cannot be sure – the Emperor Domitian banishes him to Patmos.
Matthew Henry makes the following observations about these martyred saints: “Hence note, [1.] Persecutors can only kill the body, and after that there is no more that they can do; their souls live. [2.] God has provided a good place in the better world for those who are faithful to death and are not allowed a place any longer on earth. [3.] Holy martyrs are very near to Christ in heaven, they have the highest place there. [4.] It is not their own death, but the sacrifice of Christ, that gives them a reception into heaven and a reward there; they do not wash their robes in their own blood, but in the blood of the Lamb” (Matthew Henry’s Commentary on the Whole Bible: Complete and Unabridged in One Volume, Rev. 6:9–17).
But what “testimony” has enraged the powers that be so they will slaughter the saints? Likely it is a testimony of judgment. Whether one takes a preterist view and places the Book of Revelation in the first century A.D., or a futurist view and projects these mass killings into the future Tribulation, it is the message of man’s sin and God’s judgment that differentiates the true prophet and rankles the wicked.
It has always been this way. Noah’s 120-year message of judgment goes unheaded and no doubt greatly ridiculed. Samuel’s first message from God is one of judgment on the house of Eli because he did not rebuke his sons for their wickedness. Isaiah is sent to Judah to preach a message of pending national humiliation for its sins – a message opposed and unbelieved. Jeremiah predicts the destruction of the armies of Israel and the obliteration of the temple, and for this truth he is placed in chains and finally cast into a pit. Jesus tells the Jewish leaders that He, the Son of Man, is coming one day in power and great glory, and the high priest tears his robes, accuses Jesus of blasphemy and cries for His execution. We should not be surprised that the true prophet of God preaches judgment and is hated for his honest words.
Next: O Lord … how long? (Rev. 6:9-11)
Authority was given to them (Rev. 6:7-8)
Previously: And Hades was following after him (Rev. 6:7-8)
The scripture
Rev. 6:7 – When He opened the fourth seal, I heard the voice of the fourth living creature say, “Come!” 8And I looked, and there was a pale green horse. The horseman on it was named Death, and Hades was following after him. Authority was given to them over a fourth of the earth, to kill by the sword, by famine, by plague, and by the wild animals of the earth” (HCSB).
John records that authority is given to “them” – Death and Hades, although some manuscripts read “him,” probably meaning Death – over a fourth of the earth “to kill by the sword, by famine, by plague, and by the wild animals of the earth” (v. 8b). Matthew Henry notes, “He gave them power, that is, those instruments of his anger, or those judgments themselves; he who holds the winds in his hand has all public calamities at his command, and they can only go when he sends them and no further than he permits” (Matthew Henry’s Commentary on the Whole Bible: Complete and Unabridged in One Volume, Rev. 6:3-8). But why a fourth of the earth? “God’s providence restrains both his own wrath and humanity’s violence,” according to the ESV Study Bible. Other commentators argue that the pale horse, being one of the four, simply has his equal share in the judgments to come.
Sword, famine and plague (literally thanatos, or death, but in this context meaning epidemic diseases like bubonic plague) summarize the work of the riders on the red, black and pale horses. Add to this the predatory nature of wild animals in a depopulated environment, and these four elements echo the covenant curses on Jerusalem during the Babylonian exile (Ezek. 14:21), lending support to the preterist view that the Book of Revelation is largely fulfilled in the first century A.D. at the fall of Jerusalem. However, the death of a fourth of the world’s population would be a “great tribulation” such as the world has not yet seen (Matt. 24:21), bolstering the futurist view that the events of Rev. 6-19 have yet to take place. If the futurists are correct, more than 1.6 billion people will perish, according to current population figures.
Matthew Henry makes a number of poignant observations about these four horsemen:
“(1) There is a natural as well as judicial connection between one judgment and another: war is a wasting calamity, and draws scarcity and famine after it; and famine, not allowing men proper sustenance, and forcing them to take that which is unwholesome, often draws the pestilence after it. (2) God’s quiver is full of arrows; he is never at a loss for ways and means to punish a wicked people. (3) In the book of God’s counsels he has prepared judgments for scorners as well as mercy for returning sinners. (4) In the book of the scriptures God has published threatenings against the wicked as well as promises to the righteous; and it is our duty to observe and believe the threatenings as well as the promises” (Rev. 6:3-8).
While the calamities wrought by the four horsemen appear to be either natural or man-made, we will see in the verses to come that God is orchestrating these judgments. The redeemed in heaven know it, and the wicked on earth realize it. But rather than repent, those who oppose God cry out to the rocks and mountains for death rather than to the Rock for salvation.
Four views of the fourth horseman
So what does this fourth seal mean to John’s audience in the first century – and to us today?
The preterist – who sees the events of Revelation primarily fulfilled in the first century – points to the Roman siege of Jerusalem in 70 A.D. The reference to the means of death – sword, hunger, death (pestilence) and beasts of the earth – are echoes of Ezek. 14:21, where God sends His “four devastating judgments against Jerusalem – sword, famine, dangerous animals, and plague – in order to wipe out [both] man and animal from it! Even so, there will be survivors …” In Ezekiel, God uses these judgments on Jerusalem at the hands of the Babylonians. But now His instrument of judgment is the Roman army, which kills more than 1 million, destroys the temple, ransacks Jerusalem and scatters the survivors. Josephus describes the events of 70 A.D. in this way: “So all hope of escaping was now cut off from the Jews, together with their liberty of going out of the city. Then did the famine widen its progress, and devoured the people by whole houses and families; the upper rooms were full of women and children that were dying by famine; and the lanes of the city were full of the dead bodies of the aged” (Wars, 5:12:3-4).
Historicists – who view the events of Revelation as unfolding throughout the church age – tend to see the pale horse as representing the years 248 – 268 A.D., covering the reigns of Decius, Gallus, Aemilianus, Valerian, and Gallienus. Edward Gibbon, who wrote The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, writes that from 248 – 296 A.D. “five thousand persons died daily in Rome; and many towns that escaped the hands of the barbarians were entirely depopulated” (quoted in Revelation: Four Views, p. 114). Some commentators prefer to translate the phrase “a fourth of the earth” in verse 8 as the Latin Vulgate does: “over the four parts of the earth,” referring to the four sections into which the Roman Empire is divided at the time.
Futurists – who interpret nearly all of Revelation as yet unfulfilled – contend that the events described here are global in scope and occur during the seven-year Tribulation. If fulfilled in our generation, the prophecy of one-fourth of the world’s population being killed would amount to more than 1.6 billion people – a great tribulation indeed, greater than the day of Noah, and matching the unprecedented magnitude described by Jesus in Matt. 24:21.
Finally, spiritualists, or idealists – who see Revelation as setting forth timeless truths concerning the battle between good and evil – understand the pale horse to represent death by various causes throughout the church age. Since one-quarter of the world’s population perishes, it is reasonable to see this played out over centuries rather than as a single catastrophic event. The four severe judgments – the sword, famine, pestilence, and wild beasts – symbolize all universal woes that believers suffer along with unbelievers during the present evil age.
We come now to the end of the four horsemen – conquest, war, famine and death – and hear their thundering hoof beats as they leave the vanquished behind. What’s next? What could there be in the wake of these breathtaking events? Bodies have been destroyed, but the fifth seal uncovers the souls of martyrs crying out for God’s vengeance.
Next: The fifth seal (Rev. 6:9-11)
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