The First Three Plagues
THE FIRST THREE PLAGUES
REVELATION 16:1-7
Humanity can achieve what is worthwhile only by God’s permission.
Since all the plagues are future, every attempt to give a definitive explanation to the symbolism is likely to fall short. Yet here, as elsewhere in the book, we will probably do better taking the details symbolically rather than literally.
We live in a time when most still try to keep a facade of respectability for their lives, and it is still possible for many in the public eye to hush up scandals until after their death. The minority who do not trouble about appearances nevertheless try to justify their actions by terms like freedom and self-expression and a brushing away of hypocrisy. Now, however, the reality of an evil life is to be made clear to all; the inner is to become visible.
One of the results of the gospel was very gradually to teach Christendom that violence was evil, and murder a unique sin. This recognition was always superficial; with the increasing rejection of the gospel, violence has become commonplace, and we find even Christian ministers advocating the use of violence to right wrongs. Murder has therefore become only one crime among many. With the removal of the church, murder and violence become the characteristic of the nation—“the sea” (16:3); in Old Testament thought “the blood of a dead man” means life violently taken.
Since “the angel of water” (16:5) approves of the third plague, it is clear that “the rivers and fountains of water” (16:4) are something good. In eastern Mediterranean lands, water is the most important of the gifts of heaven and, except in Egypt, it comes through rain at the right time. So we should probably think of a breakdown of the great uniformities of nature (Genesis 8:22) and of God’s generous providence (Matthew 5:45). It is a sign of human pride that so few today are any longer prepared to see the hand of God in drought and flood, storm and unseasonable weather. The picture of blood is taken from Exodus 7:17-21. Just as we can only infer the causes of the first plague in Egypt, so we must reserve judgment here; in both cases blood refers to the color, not composition, of the water. The first two plagues strike at human pride and the society humanity has created, the third at our boastful domination of nature.
When we hear “the altar cry” (16:7), we are fairly safe in interpreting it as of the earth as in 6:9. The Old Testament concept of the involvement of the soil in the life of those that live on it has been almost completely lost today.