In this week’s study, I continue in Chapter 9 finishing up the 5th trumpet.
Last week we read about the sounding of the 5th Trumpet, in which that star was falling from heaven having the key to the bottomless pit which unlocked the door to the demons of hell, being unleashed against those that hate Yahweh’s Anointed Elect, deny the True Messiah, King of Kings and Lord of Lords!!!
In our last study in Chapter 9, we were unraveling verse 7, where the description is given on these locust army. What we have concluded is the fact:
Their faces look like the faces of men. And this also suggests that these super human evil creatures are intelligent beings capable of facial expression which only adds to the menacing horror of that look that they have.
And These are not ordinary locust (Rev 9:7-9). There is an Arabic proverb that says that a locust has the head of a horse, the chest of a lion, the feet of a camel, the body of a serpent, and antennae like the hair of a woman. Each of the items in the description is grounded in the Old Testament and the literature of Second Temple Judaism.
Testament of Solomon 13.1 Then I ordered another demon to appear before me. There came before me one who had the shape of a woman but she possessed as one of her traits the form of one with disheveled hair.
Apoc. Zeph. 4.1-4Then I walked with the angel of the Lord. I looked before me and I saw a place there. 2 [Thousands] of thousands and myriads of myriads of an[gels] entered through [it]. 3 Their faces were like a leopar[d], their tusks being outside their mouth [like] the wild boars. 4 Their eyes were mixed with blood. Their hair was loose like the hair of women, and fiery scourges were in their hands.
Apoc. Zeph. 6:8That same instant I stood up, and I saw a great angel before me. His hair was spread out like the lionesses’. His teeth were outside his mouth like a bear. His hair was spread out like women’s. His body was like the serpent’s when he wished to swallow me.
These demonic locust-scorpions are given the power to torment people for five months. Although their sting is painful, the stings of a scorpion in Judea are not usually fatal to humans. These locusts with scorpion tails are only allowed to torment people for five months, but not to kill them.
Apoc. Elijah 9.1-7 They will desire death but death will flee from them. They will climb onto rocks and jump down on them, and say, “Fall on us!” And they will not die but death runs away from them.
The people tormented by these demonic beings want to die in order to escape the plague but all that awaits them is the lake of fire.
Abaddon = The name Abaddon means literally “destruction,” and is the same as Apollyon.
Apollyon = From “ἀπόλλυμι” “apollumi” - “to destroy.”
1QHa Col. xi:19-20 I thank you, Lord, because you saved my life from the pit, and from the Sheol of Abaddon 20 have lifted me up to an everlasting height, so that I can walk on a boundless plain.
1QHa Col. xi:32 The torrents of Belial break into Abaddon. The schemers of the deep howl at the din of those extracting mud.
4Q432 Frag. 4 i:4 [And when they rush forth, Sheo]l [and Abaddon open; all the arrows of] 5 [the p]it [make their voice heard] while going down [to the abyss; and the gates of Sheol] «open» 6 [for al]l […] the deed[s of the serpent.
In Revelation 9:11Abaddon is not a location but rather the “king of the locust.” In Greek, the name of the king is Apollyon, the destroyer. The Greek is related to the word ἀπολλύναι, “to destroy” but also to the name Apollo
Join me as we go Chapter by Chapter, Verse by Verse, Unraveling the Words of Yahweh!
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