A. The First Trumpet (8:6-7)
A. THE FIRST TRUMPET (8:6-7)
6. We now return to the trumpets introduced in verse 2. The angels got ready to blow them, though what is involved in prepared is not explained.
7. The blowing of the first trumpet was the signal for widespread destruction, brought about by hail and fire, the latter being most naturally understood of some electrical phenomenon accompanying a thunderstorm such as lightning or a fireball (cf. Ex. 9:24). Mixed with blood may give us the colour (cf. Joel 2:30), or it may indicate the kind of destruction brought about by the lightning. Blood was shed. Some have thought of blood-red rain such as has been attested in the Mediterranean region when the air is thick with fine red particles of sand blown in from the Sahara. But this scarcely seems adequate.
John speaks of widespread devastation among trees and grass. A third stands for a significant proportion but not the majority. The whole earth is not destroyed, but enough to give serious warning. Some find a difficulty in that in 9:4 neither grass nor green growth is to be destroyed, and ask how this could possibly be if all the green grass had already been destroyed. The answer might be, in the first instance, that this verse does not appear to mean that all the grass on earth is destroyed. Throughout this section John is concerned with plagues which affect one-third. His meaning surely is that all the grass in the one-third of the earth mentioned was burnt up. But in the second instance it is a great mistake to read this fiery, passionate and poetic spirit as though he were composing a pedantic piece of scientific prose. He is painting vivid pictures and it does not matter in the slightest that the details do not harmonize readily (see on 1:17). John does not tell us who it was who cast the fire and hail on the earth. We should understand some heavenly being, but precisely which does not matter. What matters is that God sends his plagues on evil people. This is true throughout the ages and it will be so till the End.