The Locusts of Revelation 9 - Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8
10 Reasons This Passage Was Not Fulfilled by Mohammed and Islam
What follows is a listing of ten reasons why Revelation 9:1-11 is not referring to any group of people, battles, wars, or anything else from the 4th, 5th, 6th or 7th centuries:
The seven trumpet and seven vial or bowl judgments described throughout Revelation take place during Daniel's 70th week, commonly known as the 7 year tribulation. This time period has NOT YET happened, but is to come in the future after the removal of the church in the catching away. Given that, the true fulfillment of this perplexing prophecy will be during the tribulation period, and CANNOT have occurred in the past.
The events in the fifth trumpet described in Revelation 9:1-11 have to be preceded by all the events described in the first four trumpet judgments. If you were to read about the first four trumpet judgments in Revelation chapter 8, you would understand that events like this have NOT HAPPENED yet in recorded history.
For instance, the first trumpet sees hail and fire destroying one third of the green things on earth. The second trumpet brings a large meteor or comet that turns one third of the water on earth into blood and kills one third of the sea creatures. The third trumpet brings a monstrous fiery asteroid hitting the earth, causing a third part of the rivers to become bitter. The fourth trumpet sounding results in the shortening of one third of the sun, moon and stars shine. All these catastrophic events precede the fifth trumpet, and I'd love to hear someone point out to me in history when these events have occurred.
This is an great example of stretching the rules of interpretation. The men above who equate what John saw to events in the middle east during the 6th century fail to remember that these creatures come out of the bottomless pit, which is referred to over and over in Revelation. The Greek word is "abussos", from which comes the English word "abyss". The Old Testament refers to this pit many times: it is an actual place somewhere on the earth, but probably in the area of the Euphrates River.
For the commentators above to forget, in their zeal to equate the activities of the Saracens and Muslim conquerors in the 6th and 7th centuries, that these creatures actually ascend from THE bottomless pit is an error of utmost importance.
This is not an option. The creature have actual wings and tails, as is clear from Revelation 9:9-10:
Rev 9:9
And they had breastplates, as it were breastplates of iron; and the sound of their wings was as the sound of chariots of many horses running to battle.Rev 9:10
And they had tails like unto scorpions, and there were stings in their tails: and their power was to hurt men five months.Note that their wings are not prefaced by "like unto" or "as". They had literal wings and tails. The Greek words for wings and tails are "pterux' and "oura", and are used elsewhere in describing literal features of animals. For example, in Matthew 23, Jesus used the same word wings, "pterux", in describing a hen:
Mat 23:37
O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, thou that killest the prophets, and stonest them which are sent unto thee, how often would I have gathered thy children together, even as a hen gathereth her chickens under her wings, and ye would not!If anyone can point out to me from history any Persian men who had wings or a tail, who also had the rest of the characteristics, I'd love to learn about it.
The sealing of the 144,000 Jewish men as recorded in Revelation 7, which occurs at the beginning of the 7 year tribulation, obviously precedes the events in Revelation 9. History shows, first of all, that the Muslim conquerors of the past harmed both Jews and Christians. Second, no Jews had the seal of God, and their were not 144,000 of them, back in this time. Third, the main thing these Muslim conquerors wanted to do was to harm anyone who didn't convert to their religion.
It is stretching the bounds in the worst way to say that this means they could harm any righteous Christians. The clear meaning of this verse is to let the reader/interpreter know that these are NOT actual locusts, but are supernatural, angelic locusts from the bottomless pit. Did these Muslim conquerors not walk on the grass during their days? Did their horses not trample the grass?
If the preceding six points didn't destroy the Muslim locust viewpoint, this one does. History shows that these Muslim conquerors absolutely did kill many people in their conquest. Therefore, this prophecy CANNOT have been referring to them.
Incredibly, these commentators equate the five months to 150 years. How you ask? Well, first, the five months have 150 days in them, 30 for each month. Then, they say that the laws of prophetic time demand that each day equals a year. This comes from certain passages in Ezekiel in which the prophet was told to lie on his side for forty days, which equaled Israel's 40 years in idolatry:
Eze 4:5
For I have laid upon thee the years of their iniquity, according to the number of the days, three hundred and ninety days: so shalt thou bear the iniquity of the house of Israel.Eze 4:6
And when thou hast accomplished them, lie again on thy right side, and thou shalt bear the iniquity of the house of Judah forty days: I have appointed thee each day for a year.This passage says nothing about future prophetic interpretation. If it does, then every single mention in the book of Revelation of a day, a month, 42 months, a year, etc., must be converted into years. So, the tribulation period isn't 7 years, but instead 2,520 years, according this logic. How? Well, we are told the tribulation is 7 years, or two periods of 42 months. Forty-two months have exactly 1,260 days, multiplied by 2, is 2,520 days. So, if a day equals a year, then the tribulation is 2,520 years long.
If they are going to apply this logic to Revelation 9, then they must apply throughout the rest of the book. As seen above, doing so is simply ridiculous. The plain sense of the scripture tells that the supernatural locusts torment for five actual months. A review of natural locusts will yield a similar revelation: the average locust lives 5 months, from May through September.
Again, we see the commentators testing incredulity by suggesting that this angel is figurative, not literal, in that their general goal was destruction through their conquests and their false doctrines. This is simply ridiculous. There is nothing within Revelation 9:11 which suggests anything BUT a literal interpretation:
Rev 9:11
And they had a king over them, which is the angel of the bottomless pit, whose name in the Hebrew tongue is Abaddon, but in the Greek tongue hath his name Apollyon.There are angels, and there happens to be one over the bottomless pit, a place on or somewhere beneath the earth. It's real simple to interpret this verse, but by backing themselves into the corner of interpretation they chose, they must butcher this verse to the maximum.
One may argue that there can be an unknown period of time between each trumpet, so that the 6th trumpet has not yet come to pass yet after the conquering Muslims roamed the earth is no problem. However, it is clear from the scripture that the sixth trumpet immediately follows the fifth trumpet. History shows no record of an army of 200,000,000 persons assembling in the 7th century, or ANY TIME since then. In fact, an army of 200,000,000 men in the 7th or 8th century would have taken up about one third of the population of the entire earth at the time!
