Breastplates Of Fire, Hyacinth And Brimstone: What Do These Mean?

And the number of the army of the horsemen 

were two hundred thousand thousand: and I heard the number of them. And thus I saw the horses in the 

vision, and them that sat on them, having 

breastplates of fire, and of hyacinth and brimstone:

 and the heads of the horses were as the heads 

of lions;  and out of their mouths issued fire

 and smoke  and brimstone. By these three was

 the third part of men killed, by the fire, 

and by the smoke, and by the brimstone, 

which issued out of their mouths. For their power 

is in their mouth, and in their tails: for their 

tails were like unto serpents, and had heads 

and with them they do hurt. And the rest of

 the men which were not killed by these 

plagues yet repented not of the old works 

of their hands, that they should not worship 

devils, and idols of gold, and silver, and brass, 

and stone, and of wood: nor hear, nor walk: 

they of their murders, nor of their sorceries, 

nor of their fornication, nor of their thefts.

Revelation 9:16-21

     Theologians are always looking for the meaning of Scripture and applying what they have come to believe to by correct according to their theological views. For instance: some will, and many do, always place the meaning on things that happened with and to Rome, or the Israelite nation. Some apply the symbols to things that they are familiar with: i.e., helicopters, thermonuclear war, etc., only to give their interpretation as though God has given to them some special "key." I have distanced myself from those opinion and have attempted to only look at the words and find definition and possible reasons why they were used to define the judgments and coming of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Let us then look at the symbols used in these verses.

      Horses were used in and as weapons of war by those nations that had horses such as Egypt, Syria, Persians, Romans, and others and the riders wore special equipment to protect them from harm. So we know that this symbol of a horse means war. The riders wore a breastplate of fire (the Greek means fiery) and throughout Scripture fire was used in several ways, one such way was to lead the Israelites out of Egypt. Fire was used to burn the sacrifice by Elijah. Fire is used in the Lake of Fire, Gehenna where all thrown into it are burned up. The breastplate then worn by this army had the power to destroy and cleanse the earth of, as stated, a third of the population. This breastplate was of hyacinth. A flower? Yes! That is if one does not know something of the word Hyacinth. The word Hyacinth is derived from Hyacinthus who was believed to be a handsome young Spartan prince who the gods Apollon and Zephyros loved, Hyacinthus was killed by Apollon when he threw a discus and hitting Hyacinthus in the head. Apollon was grieved and transformed the dying Hyacinthus into a larkspur flower. In Thessalonica they had their version of Hyacinthus who they also named Hymenaios (Of the Hymns) and as with Apollon love, Daphne who is associated with temples among the Lacedemonians. It is interesting to not that we have fascinating correspondence between the Jewish high priest and the king of the Spartans (Lacedemonians) of Greece. The evidence of those early inhabitants (330-309 B.C.) were in fact Israelites. We find this information in the Apocraphal book: First Maccabees, chapter 12, verses 5-23. We have passage from Flavious Josephus relating to this kinship of he Jews of the Maccbean age with the Spartans, and includes a letter of Areus king of the Lacedemonians to Onias the high priest.
(An exerpt from Antiquities xiii.5 by Flavius Josephus). Daphne had her own sacred laurel trees. There is a Temple of Apollo Daphnephoros, Eretria a 7th to 6th century temple excavated a place where citizens were to take the oath, as seen on inscriptions. We can find the temple to Apollon between and near Corinth, and towards and with Thessalonic, Ephesus, the cult of Apollon. It would seem that to use this flower, a hyacinth that is supposed to have sprung from the blood of Hyacinthus, a blue flower, has significance to false worship.Brimstone a word translated form the Hebrew and is an idiomatic expression of signs of God's wrath in the Hebrew Bible and in the New Testament. This word often appears in reference to the fate of the unfaithful. Brimstone is yellow in color and is known as sulphur, a chemical that burns. As a young boy working in the drying yards for drying fruit we used sulphur to cook the fruit so they would not blacken when laid out in the sun to dry. When you opened the tent of room where this cooking took place your eyes would burn and water, it is powerful. Notice this: the fire, the smoke, the brimstone issued out of the mouth. Those who teach heresy, false teaching are spurting out of their mouths that which God hates and will destroy. There were tails that stung and spurred poison and had heads, heads where designs are formulated and in this case to do harm to men. 

    All this comes to those who will not repent of their sins. Those works of their hands that are not governed by the commands of God. It is those who worship idols, devils, , those who will not hear, nor walk in the will of God, murderers, sorcery, and fornication, thieves. These men of this type will be destroyed. It is clear that the final words to us is that we who are alive must not fall into sinful works. We must come to know the reality of God, at any cost. You must come face to face with Him and be obedient to Him. All the promises of God are of no avail to us until obedience, then we can understand the nature of God. We must be "born again," of obedience and then by our obedient life we can say "Amen" to a promise, then that promise is yours. 

LORD, who shall abide in they tabernacle?

     Who shall dwell in Thy holy hill? 

He that walketh uprightly, speaketh the

     truth in his heart.

                  Psalm 15:1-2

Do not chase fables

Richard L. Crumb

Who Are Those Four Angels Loosed From The Euphrates River?

One woe is past; and, behold, there come 

two woes more hereafter. And the sixth 

angel sounded, and I heard a voice from 

the four horns of the golden altar which 

is before God, saying to the sixth angel 

which had the trumpet, Loose the four 

angels which are bound in the great river 

Euphrates. And the four angels were loosed, 

which were prepared for an hour, and a day, 

and a month, and a year, for to slay the 

third part of men. And the number of the 

army of the horsemen were two hundred thousand thousand: and I heard the number of them.  

Revelation 9:12-16

     It is understandable if you get confused about all this symbolism, and references to the earth, or the Euphrates River, the winds, trumpets, and such, but do not despair you need only to go slow, think, read, pray, and do not read more into this than what Scripture allows. We do no that woes will come upon the earth. What is a woe? It is a grievous distress, affliction, or trouble. A woe is grief. There is not one woe but three and this denotes much sorrow, grief, despair, and trouble, not for all but for some, those who will not repent and be saved by Jesus Christ. 

     A sixth angel blows his trumpet. A trumpet is not an article of war but a message and this message was a voice from the golden altar that is before God. Some, depending on their theological view say that this is prayer from those around the throne, and it may be such that bring punishment to the earth but the Greek word is singular, accusative, not plural so only a voice was heard. Does man have the power to instruct angels? No! but in this case the voice, singularly, some will say that this is just as a choir sings as one voice, be as that may, this voice, this sound of the trumpet was saying to loose the four angels that were bound in the river Euphrates. What does this mean? Rather than get caught up in some historical, preterest, or futurist theological view I will simply look at this from what is known. The river Euphrates was a traditional boundary for the land of the Israelites and of the Roman Empire. The Euphrates river ran east of Israel and met with the Tigris river at Babylon. This river arises in Turkey and is 1,740 miles long, it flows across Syria and through Iraq and with the Tigris, it defines and area known historically as Mesopotamia (means land between two rivers). The Euphrates river defines the north and the east while the desert and the Red Sea, with the Sinai define the border to the south and west. These natural barriers served as a barrier to invaders from the east so then it would be good to simply say that the Euphrates river is a restraint upon the forces of evil. The loosing of angels that were bound, restrained from doing harm to God's children were evil angels and were to be used by God, not forever but for a time, an hour and a day, and a month, and a year. What this means simply is that not a minute, an hour, a day, or month for a year will this woe be stopped. This evil angels will slay a third part of man. Not all men will die only a part. These evil angels have an army, riding horses and were and if my calculations are correct this means 200 million, but the Greek simply means myriads a great indefinite number so do not get all caught up on numbers, they are many too many to count. 

     I will continue this tomorrow, Lord willing, so as not to get to bogged down in these verses. What we do know, once again, we must not be of those that are inflicted by the woes sent to them from the golden altar, by God. Build your life on the Rock (Jesus Christ) and you will not be moved by any trial that may come your way. Oh, you may feel the heat but not the final outcome. God will take you through all that come your way, that is, if you let Him.

Thus saith the LORD of hosts,

    the God of Israel, Amend your

ways and your doings, and I will

    cause you to dwell in this place.

                         Jeremiah 7:3

Stay close to God: He is your protection

Richard L. Crumb

Judgment So Bad Man Desires To Die: But Cannot

And in those days shall men seek death, and 

shall not find it; and shall desire to die, and death shall flee from them. And the  shapes of the locusts

 were like unto horses prepared unto battle; and on their heads were as it were crowns like gold, 

and their faces were as the faces of men. And 

they had hair as the hair of women, and their

 teeth were as the teeth of lions. 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. 

And they had tails like unto scorpions, and there 

were stings in their tails: and their power was 

to hurt men five months. And they had a king 

over them, which is the angel of the bottomless pit, 

whose name in Hebrew tongs is Abaddon, but in 

the Greek tongue hath his name Apollyon.

Revelation 9:6-11

     Over the years much has been attempted to give present day interpretation such words as penned in these verses. In the days of these plagues brought upon the earth, upon man causes man to suffer and desire death because they are so horrible, but they cannot die due to them, they seek death in vain. There is a difference in the wording from the Critical Text (NIV, ESV, ASV, etc. where the word "not" is a double negative meaning never, not, nothing, οὺ μὲ: the Textus Receptus, the Geneva Bible, the King James Bible uses Ούκ), now, this difference may not seem to be too much but it is for when a person is preaching or determining their interpretation then they will preach one thing which the one preaching from the Textus Receptus will preach 

another. The words used in the Critical Text is to be rendered literally: not, but, or but not and the word used in the Textus Receptus means simply, not. Some will preach that due to the double negative man cannot die, but if God wanted to ensure that we understand this that way would He not have John use οὺ ε̃τι that means "no more," "no longer," "not now." What is better to say is that man will suffer so badly that they would rather die but death alludes them, they suffer so much but this suffering does not lead to death. Some allude that God is not allowing them to die, even causing them to endure much suffering, but this seems that God cause this pain to the point of wanting to die and would go against God making Him and evil god. Man causes their own pain and suffering, but God in His Providence will allow this so that man who will not come to Him and be saved will by their own hand cause this pain. God chastises but man must learn from this chastizement and turn from the sinful ways. In this case, man will not do this so they suffer. 

     John sees images of shapes, shaped in the form of a locust. What is this locust? First, a locust is an insect and can be eaten as with John the Baptist, and they appear as monsters being let loose by divine judgment to inflict man five months, the life of a locust. Now we have information about this time  of five months as will as understanding that these locusts represent divine judgment. Many interpretations are allegorical, or some other foolish interpretation. The Golden Rule of interpretation is to allow Scripture to interpret Scripture and when we see darkly to not fall into false interpretation due to our presuppositions. If we do not do this and interpret symbolism through allegory we embark upon a sea of conjecture. We do not want to jettison literal interpretation by using critical and simple thinking.

      The fact that these scorpions had crowns on their head insinuates power, authority and that they were shaped like horses gives credence to this but their faces were like men. We have men today in authority, in Christian Churches who are like a scorpion misusing Scripture, their authority and many follow after them, they had hair like a woman, possibly alluding to the long wispy hair on a lion for they had teeth like a lion. Teeth of a lion tears apart their prey to devour they prey. Strong they were, and are for they had breastplates of iron for protection and they make loud noise as in a rushing chariot or horses going to battle. Thing of those "preachers," who shout and dance about trying their very best to cause emotion, not good emotion, but emotion for people to be so afraid of them that they will do what they ask. But, they have tails like a scorpion that sting and had this power to hurt. How long? Five months, so it is not forever for God will end this Himself when He comes back on the Last Day. 

     The name of the leader of all this suffering is Apollyon that means in Greek: Destroyer. Satan is the great destroyer of man and he does not care if he has to cause great suffering so that in his way he attempts to get man to give to him authority as if he was God.

     Practical application: You, me, if we do not want this or any other plague brought upon man by Satan, then you must repent and be saved. There is no other way.

Keep silence before Me, O Islands;

     and let the people renew their 

strength: let them come near;

     then let them speak: let us

come near together to judgment.

                    Isaiah 41:1

Christ The Solid Rock: Stand On It

Richard L. Crumb