Revelation 16:16–16:21

THE SEVEN BOWLS OF THE SEVEN PLAGUES-continued

Revelation 16:16–16:21

Rev 16:16  And the demonic spirits gathered all the rulers and their armies to a place with the Hebrew name Armageddon.

 

The demonic spirits all of Satan's fallen angels. You might want to note that the verse says all his rulers and armies. That is what is left in this world so who are they fighting? Life Application New Testament Commentary: Some archaeologists have located this battlefield near the city of Megiddo (southeast of the modern port of Haifa), which guarded a large plain in northern Israel. This is a strategic location near a prominent international highway leading north from Egypt through Israel, along the coast, and on to Babylon. Megiddo overlooks the entire plain southward toward Galilee and westward toward the mountains of Gilboa. Over 200 battles have been fought in this area (see, for example, Jdg_5:19; 2Ki_9:27). While this may be the location of the battle, the actual meaning of Armageddon is unknown. The word har in Hebrew means “mountain,” but there is no mountain in the area of Megiddo. “Mountain” may have been used to describe God’s presence—for he often would meet with people on mountains (Exo_19:3; Exo_19:11-23; Exo_24:12; 1Ki_19:11; Eze_40:2; Mat_17:1). The Aramaic meaning of the word “Armageddon” is “mount of the assembly”; thus, this may refer to the assembly of the kings who come to fight. John’s unusual use of the explanation “in Hebrew” to a group of readers who for the most part probably did not know Hebrew probably alerts them to the symbolic nature of what he was writing (see also Rev_9:11).

Rev 16:17  Then the seventh angel poured out his bowl into the air. And a mighty shout came from the throne in the Temple, saying, "It is finished!" Rev 16:18  Then the thunder crashed and rolled, and lightning flashed. And a great earthquake struck—the worst since people were placed on the earth.

The seventh angel poured out the bowl there may have been a shout from the throne, the martyrs, but it also contains, thunder lightening hail and earthquakes virtually demolishing most everything on earth. The earth as we know it is all gone. There are so many faults in the earth's core that if they all moved at once it is easy to see the massive destruction that would have occurred.  In modern day we have seen catastrophes one or two at a time. From Live science : The unexpected disaster was neither the largest nor deadliest earthquake and tsunami to strike this century. That record goes to the 2004 Banda-Aceh earthquake and tsunami in Sumatra, a magnitude-9.1, which killed more than 230,000 people. But Japan's one-two punch proved especially devastating for the earthquake-savvy country, because few scientists had predicted the country would experience such a large earthquake and tsunami

Rev 16:19  The great city of Babylon split into three sections, and the cities of many nations fell into heaps of rubble. So God remembered all of Babylon's sins, and He made her drink the cup that was filled with the wine of His fierce wrath. Rev 16:20  And every island disappeared, and all the mountains were leveled. Rev 16:21  There was a terrible hailstorm, and hailstones weighing as much as seventy-five pounds fell from the sky onto the people below. They cursed God because of the terrible plague of the hailstorm

The City of Babylon was the possibly the first city in the world that had 200,000 residents. Now it is a bump in the sand only. It was a Sodom and Gomorrah of its time. I do not think that Babylon will be  resurrected but the idea will. These writings were in a time when Babylon was a great city. People possibly thought that it was invincible.

Agape,

Dave