Days of Vengeance - The Preterist Archive

16:1-3
5 And I heard the Angel of the Waters saying: Righteous
art Thou, who art and who wast, O Holy One, because
Thou didst judge these things;
6 for they poured out the blood of saints and prophets, and
Thou hast given them blood to drink: They are worthy!
7 And I heard the altar saying: Yes, O Lord God, the
Almighty, true and righteous are Thy judgments.
8 And the fourth angel poured out his Chalice upon the
sun; and it was given to it to scorch the men with fire.
9 And the men were scorched with great heat; and the men
blasphemed the name of God who has the power over
these plagues; and they did not repent, so as to give Him
glory.
1 The command authorizing the judgments is given by
a loud Voice from the Temple, again underscoring
both the divine and ecclesiastical origin of these
terrible plagues (cf. 15:5-8). 2 “The judgments of the
vials are the overflow of the wrath of God blazing forth
and filling his temple, a visitation or presence
vouchsafed in response to the prayers of his saints.” 3
The seven angels (cf. 15:1) are told to pour out the
Chalices of God’s wrath: The Septuagint uses this verb
(ekcheo – ) in the directions to the priest to pour out the
blood of the sacrifice around the base of the altar (cf.
Lev. 4:7, 12, 18, 25, 30, 34; 8:15; 9:9). The term is used
in Ezekiel with reference to apostate Israel’s fornication
with the heathen (Ezek. 16:36; 23:8), of her shedding
of innocent blood through oppression and idolatry
(Ezek. 22:3-4, 6, 9, 12, 27), and of God’s threat to pour
out His wrath upon her (Ezek. 14:19; 20:8, 13, 21;
21:31). In the New Testament, it is similarly used in
contexts that parallel major themes in Revelation: the
spilling of wine (Matt. 9:17; Mark 2:22; Luke 5 :37),
the shedding of Christ’s blood (Matt. 26:28; Mark
14:24; Luke 22:20), the shedding of the martyrs’ blood
(Matt. 23:35; Luke 11:50; Acts 22:20; Rom. 3:15), and
the outpouring of the Spirit (Acts 2:17-18, 33; 10:45;
Rom. 5:5; Tit. 3:6; cf. Joel 2:28-29; Zech. 12:10). All
these different associations are in the background of
this outpouring of plagues into the Land that has
spilled the blood of Christ and His witnesses, the
people who have resisted and rejected the Spirit: The
old wineskins of Israel are about to split open.
2 As the first angel pours out his Chalice into the
Land, it becomes a loathsome and malignant sore
upon the men who had the mark of the Beast and
who worshiped his image. The sores are a fitting
retribution for apostasy, “a hideous stamp avenging the
mark of the Beast” 4 – as if the mark had “broken out in
a deadly infection.” 5 Just as God had poured out boils
on the ungodly, state-worshiping Egyptians who
persecuted His people (Ex. 9:8-11), so He is plaguing
these worshipers of the Beast in the Land of Israel – the
Covenant people who have now become Egyptian
persecutors of the Church. This plague is specifically
mentioned by Moses in his list of the curses of the
Covenant for idolatry and apostasy: “The LORD will
smite you with the boils of Egypt and with tumors and
with the scab and with the itch, from which you cannot
be healed. . . . The LORD will strike you on the knees
and legs with sore boils, from which you cannot be
healed, from the sole of your foot to the crown of your
head” (Deut. 28:27, 35).
3 The second angel pours out his Chalice into the sea,
and it becomes blood, as in the first Egyptian plague
(Ex. 7:17-21) and the Second Trumpet (Rev. 8:8-9).
This time, however, the blood is not running in
streams, but instead is like that of a dead man: clotted,
coagulated, and putrefying. 6 Blood is mentioned four
times in this chapter; it covers the face of Israel, spilling
over the four corners of the Land.
While the primary significance of this plague is
symbolic, referring to the uncleanness of contact with
blood and death (cf. Lev. 7:26-27; 15:19-33; 17:10-16;
21:1; Num. 5:2; 19:11-19), there are close parallels in
the actual events of the Great Tribulation. On one
occasion, thousands of Jewish rebels fled to the Sea of
Galilee from the Roman massacre of Tarichaeae.
Setting out on the lake in small, flimsy boats, they were
soon pursued and overtaken by the sturdy rafts of
Vespasian’s superior forces. Then, as Josephus recounts,
they were mercilessly slaughtered: “The Jews could
neither escape to land, where all were in arms against
them, nor sustain a naval battle on equal terms. . . .
Disaster overtook them and they were sent to the
bottom, boats and all. Some tried to break through, but
the Romans could reach them with their lances, killing
others by leaping upon the barks and passing their
swords through their bodies; sometimes as the rafts
closed in, the Jews were caught in the middle and
captured along with their vessels. If any of those who
had been plunged into the water came to the surface,
they were quickly dispatched with an arrow or a raft
overtook them; if, in their extremity, they attempted to
climb on board the enemy’s rafts, the Romans cut off
their heads or their hands. So these wretches died on
every side in countless numbers and in every possible
way, until the survivors were routed and driven onto
the shore, their vessels surrounded by the enemy. As
they threw themselves on them, many were speared
while still in the water; many jumped ashore, where
they were killed by the Romans.
“One could see the whole lake stained with blood and
2. Cf. Isa. 66:6 – “A Voice of uproar from the City, a Voice from the Temple:
The Voice of the LORD who is rendering recompense to His enemies!”
3. Austin Farrer, The Revelation of St. John the Divine (Oxford: At the Clarendon
Press, 1964), p. 175.
4. Ibid., p. 175.
5. J. P. M. Sweet, Revelation (Philadelphia: The Westminster Press, 1979), p.
244.
6. In passing, we may note here an example of the constant tendency of the socalled
“literalist” interpretation to indulge in fanciful speculations regarding
the fulfillment of these prophecies. Dr. Henry Morris, who has written what
his publishers have called “the most literal exposition of Revelation you will
ever read!” offers his interpretation of this phenomenon: “It is merely a
chemical solution, water containing iron and other chemicals which give it
a blood-red appearance” (The Revelation Record: A Scientific and Devotional
Commentary on the Book of Revelation [Wheaton: Tyndale House Publishers,
1983], p. 298). This is especially interesting in light of his stated principle of
interpretation: “Actually, a ‘literal interpretation’ is a contradiction in terms,
since one does not interpret (that is, ‘translate’ saying ‘this means that’) if he
simply accepts a statement as meaning precisely what it says. Furthermore,
the terms ‘more literal’ or ‘most literal’ are redundancies. Literal is literal” (p.
24).
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