That there was a “flood of … moral and spiritual errors” is in fact an understatement, for the sanity and civility of the Jewish society had vanished altogether. Anyone acquainted with the relevant Historicist facts and with the work of evil spirits in Scripture will be able to see the possibility that a massive demonic delusion accounts for the behavior of the Jews. David Chilton describes the evidence from history that the Jews in the Last Days (A.D. 66–70) had literally become demonized:

The entire generation became increasingly demon-possessed; their progressive national insanity is apparent as one reads through the New Testament, and its horrifying final stages in the pages of Josephus’ The Jewish War: the loss of all ability to reason, the frenzied mobs attacking one another, the deluded multitudes following the most transparently false prophets, the crazed and desperate chase after food, the mass murders, executions and suicides, the fathers slaughtering their own families and the mothers eating their own children. Satan and the host of hell simply swarmed through the land of Israel and consumed the apostates.

The king over the locusts is Satan himself. Jesus had said that the Jewish apostates were children of the devil (John 8:44), and “a synagogue of Satan” (Rev. 2:9; 3:9). David Chilton writes:

Clearly, for Satan’s entire host of destroyers to be let loose upon the Jewish nation was a hell on earth indeed. And yet St. John tells us that this outbreak of demons in the land is only the first Woe.

Ironside conjectures that this fallen star (v. 1) is the same as the one mentioned under the third trumpet (8:10), whom he identified with the pope. However, while he believes the key (v. 1) represents “a system of teaching, and possibly ritual observances connected with it” and thinks that this trumpet describes “the development of apostasy of which [the pope] is evidently the head,” yet he does not see Romanism as the heresy. He writes: “I do not think we will be far wrong if we identify with this coming delusion the occult systems of gnostic origin, so largely prevailing and so rapidly spreading at the present time.” As examples of the various manifestations of this error, Ironside lists “New Thought, New Theology, Eddyism [Christian Science], Spiritism, Theosophy, and other offshoots of these evil systems”—or what might be called, in our own time, “New Age” religions. The locusts (v. 3), therefore, “aptly typify or symbolize the spiritual plague of the last days.”

Ryrie, Walvoord, and Morris, who preferred a literal interpretation of the burning “mountain” and the falling “star” in the second and third trumpets, agree that the fallen star in this chapter “seems to refer to a person rather than a literal star or meteor” (Walvoord). Lindsey, for the first time up to this point, does not see an object that falls from heaven as a nuclear bomb. These writers believe this star to be “none other than Satan himself” (Walvoord, Lindsey).

Walvoord, Ryrie, Gaebelein, Tenney, Morris, and others identify the bottomless pit as the abode or prison house of demons. Therefore, they understand the locusts as demonic hordes released against the unrepentant sinners in the Tribulation period. The demons do not kill (v. 5), but only torment their victims, and are only allowed to afflict those men who do not have the seal of God on their foreheads (v. 4), so the 144,000 sealed in chapter 7 will be exempt.

Those who understand these as demonic creatures generally do not attempt to explain the features of the locusts (v. 7) as symbolic of anything else, but see them as a straightforward description of their actual appearance.

It is probable that the figurative language of this vision refers to the Roman armies or their confederates, following upon the demonic “locust” invasions that came upon the apostates of Israel. Many of the troops that came into Palestine had been stationed previously at the Euphrates (v. 14). David Clark writes that

the river Euphrates was the boundary between Israel and her ancient captors. It was across the Euphrates that Assyria came and carried Israel into captivity. And it was across the Euphrates that Babylon came and carried Judah into captivity. The great conquerors of Palestine and Egypt had come across the Euphrates in ancient times.

The army is fearsome both in appearance and in numbers, although the number given, two hundred million (v. 16), is not to be pressed as a literal calculation

Though some see the four angels (v. 14) here as the same four angels in 7:1, who had authority over the four winds, this identification is considered unlikely by Walvoord or Gaebelein. These four are evil angels, presently bound until the moment ordained by God, at which time they will be loosed to kill a third of mankind. This destruction is apparently accomplished through the great army described in the verses immediately following. The mention of the Euphrates (v. 14) suggests that the armies come in from the east, as Walvoord writes: “Why should they be bound in or at the Euphrates? The answer seems to be that the vision concerns an invasion from the Orient.”

Ray Stedman takes the view that it “would be virtually impossible for any one nation—or even a coalition of nations such as NATO—to field such a vast army.” Using the Gulf War of 1991 for a comparison, he points out that the combined troops of the thirty-nation United Nations coalition only amounted to about one million persons in uniform. The former Soviet Union had the largest army in the world, numbering about three million men, followed by China with 2.3 million and India with 1.1 million. Stedman concludes that all the armies in the world must be involved in a battle that employs two hundred million troops.

More than one writer has found in the imagery indications of modern weaponry. Stedman writes: “It seems clear that what John envisions for us is the machinery of modern (or future) military destruction translated into the military terminology of his own day.” He then suggests the identification of the individual features of the vision with such apparatus as tanks, troop carriers, missile launchers, rocket batteries, helicopter gunships, etc.

Commenting on the breastplates of fiery red, hyacinth blue, and sulfur yellow (v. 17), Walvoord writes: “Some have interpreted the description as John’s understanding of a scene in which modern warfare is under way.” Regarding the fact that the horses have heads of lions; and out of their mouths came fire, smoke, and brimstone (v. 17), his comment is: “This again is a description that might be comparable to modern mechanical warfare.”

This mighty angel (v. 1) is, no doubt, Jesus Himself. His face shining like the sun is a feature mentioned in the vision of the first chapter (1:16). The rainbow, which is now on his head, was seen around the throne of God in Revelation 4:3. The angel has a little book open in his hand (v. 2), which becomes the primary point of interest in the chapter. He has his left foot on the land and his right foot on the sea (v. 2). David Chilton explains that

in the Bible, and especially in the Book of Revelation, “Sea and Land” seem to represent the Gentile nations contrasted with the Land of Israel (2 Sam. 22:4–5; Ps. 65:7–8; Isa. 5:30; 17:12–13; 57:20; Jer. 6:23; Luke 21:25; Rev. 13:1, 11).

But what is this book in his hand? According to David S. Clark,

evidently the reasonable explanation is that it was the same book that we saw in the fifth chapter sealed with seven seals; or rather what is left of it. The seven seals have been opened, so this book appears opened. We are now in the seventh seal that disclosed seven trumpets and we are in the events of the sixth trumpet.… Little remains of the contents of that book and it is now described as “little.”

The martyrs seen under the altar in chapter 6 were told to wait “a little while longer” until the proper time for vengeance to be taken upon their murderers. Now we read that the little while has passed and there should be delay no longer (v. 6). David S. Clark writes that:

now we see Christ come down with that same book in his hand with every seal opened to declare that the time is up; and the prayers of his saints are to be answered; and the blood of his martyrs judged or avenged; and the last great catastrophe shall fall on the first great persecutor of the Christian church.

Walvoord, with the majority of writers, sees the section that begins here as “a parenthetical section … which continues through 11:14. Like chapter 7 it does not advance the narrative but presents other facts which contribute to the total prophetic scene.”

The descending angel (v. 1) that dominates this scene is thought by some (e.g., Gaebelein, Ironside, Henry Morris, Walter Scott) to be Christ Himself. Others (e.g., Walvoord, Ryrie, J. B. Smith) disagree, believing that “the evidence seems to support the idea that here is a holy angel to whom has been given great power and authority” (Walvoord).

The fact that John was forbidden to write what he heard from the seven thunders (v. 4) has caused both curiosity and speculation. Ironside offers an explanation based on the atonement:

As Mediator of the New Covenant He seals up the utterance of the seven thunders. They speak of judgment due to wayward man, but He Himself has borne the judgment, and those who trust in Him need never know its dreadful secrets.

How great has been that mystery! Evil had apparently triumphed; the heavens for so long have been silent. Satan had been permitted to be the god of this age deceiving the nations.… And now the time has come when the mystery of God will be completed.

The action of eating the little book (v. 10), and reference to how it affected the mouth and stomach, is an imitation of the identical actions of Ezekiel the prophet (see Ezek. 3:1–3, 14). Ezekiel’s prophecy was about the destruction of Jerusalem at the hands of the Babylonians in 586 b.c. John’s similar action also is connected with his prophesying the destruction of Jerusalem, this time by the Romans in a.d. 70.

Since Walvoord considers the book itself “to be a symbol of the Word of God as it is delivered to men, that is, divine revelation already given,” he explains John’s bittersweet experience in eating it as follows:

To John the Word of God is sweet, in that it is a word of promise, a word of grace, and a revelation of the love of God.… More particularly, however, the Word of God is bitter in that it not only contains promises of grace but, as the book of Revelation itself abundantly illustrates, it reveals the divine judgments which will be poured out on the earth as God deals in wrath with the wicked world.